The Black Hand
by K.C.Dragonfly
Summary: Past and present collide in this modern day mystery that harks back to a time when the Mafia owned Las Vegas. Three tales, three states, three murders ... and a CSI's life on the line for a crime that happened 46 years ago. Can the team figure out this complicated riddle before time runs out for Sara?
1. August 2nd 1958

**New job, new story :)**

**This is something I've wanted to do for a while, and I'm not sure it'll work out but there's only one way to find out! Basically, it's going to flash backwards and forwards in time, charting three different stories that all interlock in past and present. Some details are linked to canon plots, others are made up by myself. I will put headings in bold to explain where and when each bit is taking place, so hopefully it will make sense. If there's no heading, it's present tense (circa season 4). **

**Also, as I am learning Italian, there will be some Italian dialogue. I will put the English translation in [_italics_] next to it, to make things simpler to understand. **

**Disclaimer: I don't own CSI, the characters or the mafia. Obviously. **

**x x x x**

"Non abbiamo mai pianificato in questo modo." _[We never planned it that way]_  
He took a long drag on his cigarette and exhaled slowly. In her binding chains, she could only turn her head away from the cloud of smoke that billowed over her. "Ma a volte in questo modo le carte cadono." _[But sometimes that's the way the cards fall]_

"Perche?" _[Why?] _She queried hoarsely, shifting her weight and wincing at the shot of pain that ran through her wrists at the meagre action. "Perche non si dice nulla?" _[Why didn't you say anything?]_

He emitted a dark chuckle and sat forwards, the smell of stale smoke and whiskey encircling her like a thick, impenetrable fog.

"Perche..." _[Because...]_ he answered cryptically, coughing out a sigh. "Perche non e come il gioco viene giocato." _[Because that's not how the game is played]_

**X x x**

**August 2****nd,**** 1958 - - The Sands Hotel and Casino; The Copa Room **

The scent of sweat and perfume and sickly sweet alcohol sweeps around the room in dizzying musk.

Sammy Davis Junior has just left the stage into the throng of sharp-suited guys and sparkling dolls gathered at the bottom of the steps. Now, as the house lights dip and a gentle cheer meanders around the room, the stage is filled with the striking figure of Lois O'Neill in all her glory; flanked by the eternally beautiful Copa Girls.

The man sitting at Angelo's side was fixated on the girl to the far left of the stage – a stunning red-head by the name of Lily. She caught him staring and flashed a knowing grin, her perfectly coiffed curls bouncing off her glittering sequined shoulders.

"Ahem." Angelo coughed, dragging the man's attention back from the dancer. Sam turned languidly to face him, his blue eyes practically alight against his midnight black hair and lightly tanned face. "Can we start?"

His accent was thick and un-Americanised, not unlike most of his current company.

"Of course." Sam cleared his throat, seeking a glimpse of the man sat directly opposite him in the discreet booth. He had been silent since their arrival, stirring his drink rhythmically as he eyed his companions with unadulterated suspicion. Sam had no doubt that he had purposefully chosen the seat that was the most shrouded in shadow. Concealment – the first sign that a man was not to be trusted.

The fourth and final member of their little group, a tall Sicilian with striking features and a volatile temper to rival that of his reputation, had been observing them each in turn through narrowed almost-black eyes. Now, he sat forward and pushed his glass aside with the back of a bejewelled hand.

"Gentlemen." He began, his voice low and unexpectedly husky. "You all know what's going to happen soon. Momo is on a slippery slope – he's bringing in too much heat and Tony Accardo isn't going to stand for it too much longer."

"You know something that we don't?" Sam queried, taking a slow sip of his own drink. He had been sceptical when the man had summoned them all to this exclusive little meeting and that uncertainty had continued to plague him the longer they sat in brooding silence.

"What, do you want proof?" The man shot back sarcastically. "It's the business. It happened to Bugsy and Capone, it'll happen to Giancana. Soon."

"Okay." Angelo also leant forwards, folding his hands on the table and glancing around the room edgily. It wasn't that he was nervous, per se, but talking about well known mobsters in the open like this tended to set his teeth on edge; especially in light of current events in Cuba and the CIA's growing interest in the mafia's involvement. "What exactly does that have to do with us?"

"When Giancana bites it, it's going to leave quite the hole in the business." The man explained. "I'm proposing that we fill that hole."

"I'm not sure Accardo will go for that." Sam half-joked, his glass clinking off his rings as he passed it idly between his hands.

"Accardo won't get a say in it." The man hissed, as if that was obvious. "Because we're going to remove him from the equation."

"Whoa." Angelo nearly choked on his brandy. "You're not saying we take out Tony?"

"That's exactly what I'm saying." There was a cool evenness to his response that was deeply unsettling. He was cocky, confident; and for a man with such an unstable personality, that was rarely a precursor to success.

"What about Ricca?" The man in the shadows asked at last, his eyes remaining shielded by the protective shadow of the curtain hanging around their booth.

"You let me deal with Ricca." The man insisted with a dismissive flick of the wrist.

"I don't know about this." Angelo shifted. "I mean, I'm all for moving up in the business, but taking over the Outfit? That's some big bones we're messing with."

"He's right." Sam agreed. "Accardo's a good man. What makes you think you can do better?"

"I know I can do better." He snapped back insolently. "I've got plans for this town – big plans. Accardo, he's a Chicago man. He doesn't know this city the way I do – the way we do!"

"We've all got plans for this town." Sam interjected sternly. "But that doesn't give us or anyone else the right to mess with the system. You go after a mark as big as Accardo, you're only going to start a war."

"A war means the feds." Angelo pointed out. "And I don't know about the rest of you, but I don't want to see out my days on Alcatraz."

The man swung his gaze rapidly from one face to the other in sullen silence for an agonizingly long two minutes.

Then, without warning, he slammed his empty glass onto the table and rocked to his feet, glowering down at them all as if challenging them in turn to stand up and meet him at eye-level.

"Vivere per pentito di questo decisione." He spat in disgust when none of them moved. "I won't forget this."

A few people at nearby tables turned towards the outburst, but most carried on their celebrations regardless as he forced his wide frame out from behind the booth, snatching his hat from the edge of the table as he went, and tore through the dancers and the drinkers towards the little-known rear entrance behind the bar.

The music continued in the wake of his departure, bright and lively and distinctly American; in stark contrast to the mood at the table where three men now sat in contemplative muteness.

"Well." Shadow-man stated after the long silence became too much. He downed the last of his drink, stood up and addressed his comrades directly for the first time. "Gentlemen." He tipped his hat, which, unlike the others, had never left his head throughout the meeting. Then, after tossing a few notes onto the table - enough to cover his own drinks and then some - he stuffed his hands into his pockets and mooched towards the exit.

Angelo and Sam both watched in mutual awe as he cut an imposing figure, coursing through the crowd like a silhouette. Impressive and threatening, but easily forgotten, Nino Carmine was the perfect mobster.

They would sit there a few minutes more, sipping their drinks in silence, before following suit; Angelo first, slipping through the intoxicated revelers unnoticed and out into the warm summer night breeze. He would hail a cab and then think better of it and walk back to his hotel room in a vain attempt to clear the nagging concerns swirling around his alcohol-fuddled mind.

Sam would wait longer, until Lily Flynn had finished her shift. And then, like a gentlemen, he would escort her home, down the increasingly illuminated street of Las Vegas rapidly coming to be known as 'The Strip'.


	2. July 3rd 2004

**July 3****rd,**** 2004; Downtown Las Vegas **

It was a thick, muggy heat; the kind that encircles you and clings to every inch of exposed skin.

He slammed the trunk shut and stepped out from the shade into the blazing morning sun, his kit a dull weight as it swung rhythmically against his leg with every weary step he took.

"Oh man." He groaned, rolling his achy shoulders beneath a heavy CSI vest. "Of all the days for a trash-run."

It had been a desperately long shift and he had yearned to leave the sticky summer heat behind for a couple of chilled beers in an air-conditioned sports bar somewhere off-strip.  
He could almost taste the cooked breakfast waiting for him at the diner; where the pretty young blonde would be waiting too, with a pleasant smile and an extra rasher of bacon just for him.

And then, to his eternal dismay, a pleading phone call from Grissom and a bad round of rock, paper scissors with Nick had hauled him away from the fantasy notion of making it home before noon and out here to the cesspit of downtown Las Vegas.

The uniformed officer standing guard looked equally pissed off at being summoned out here, but wisely kept his mouth shut and silently lifted the yellow crime scene tape for the criminologist to duck underneath.

Adjusting the camera strap slung over his shoulder, Warrick set off down the narrow alley. Commercial dumpsters – un-emptied for a fortnight thanks to the current city-wide waste-disposal strikes – spilled over into his path and he had to swat his way through a cloud of hyperactive flies buzzing and flitting hungrily over the plentiful source of food.

But trash wasn't all they were feasting on today.

The smell reached him long before the sight of the body did and he curled his nose up in disgust.

"Phew!" He whistled, crouching down beside the decimated corpse. "He's been here a while."

"Judging from the level of decomposition, I'd estimate at least a week." David Phillips agreed dejectedly, already harbouring deep resentment to Doc Robbins for dispatching him out on this one.

"A week in this heat." Warrick shook his head. "Damn."

The man in question was face up on the ground, partially concealed by a large graffiti-stained trash can and a stack of old pizza boxes that presumably belonged to the dodgy takeout place behind them. His once-black Armani suit was now grey with accumulated dust and grime; and lying discarded on his stomach was a point-38 pistol.

"Gun left on the body." The CSI noted with a hint of apprehension, wiping the rapidly collecting sweat off his forehead with the back of a gloved hand. He'd been in the scene five minutes and he already felt dirty. "I don't like where this is going."

"Well you're probably not going to like this, either."

David reached across to lift the sheet he had placed over the victim's face, revealing the apparent cause of death.

"Oh, man." Warrick recoiled. "That is a lot of bullet holes."

"We'll get the full count at autopsy." The assistant coroner assured him. "I don't see any bullet casings though."

"Killer probably took them with him. This reeks of a mob hit." Warrick sighed, swinging the camera off his shoulder to photograph the still-oozing wounds where the man's face used to be.

"This just reeks." He heard the disgruntled mutter from the cop at the end of the alley, but chose to ignore it and gestured again towards the body.

"You, uh, check his pockets yet, Super Dave?"

"Not yet." David took the question as an invitation to delve into the suit jacket and extracted what was once a rather expensive leather wallet, holding it up between his thumb and forefinger.

"Thanks," Warrick smirked sarcastically as he accepted the greasy offering and carefully peeled it open.

The image that met him was instantly recognisable – unlike the unfortunate remains currently sprawled before him.

"Whoa." He gasped, feeling instantly better about landing this case. "Nino Carmine."

"You know him?" David asked, softening his voice in pre-emptive sympathy.

"Know him?" Warrick scoffed. "I grew up listening to stories about this guy. He's a big time mobster from way back in the day."

"Oh." Dave nodded, giving the deceased a once-over. He may have been a big shot in his time, but right now he was just one step up from human soup. "Well, maybe he got _too_ big time for somebody's liking."

"Yeah." Rick drawled, seeking out the empty holes where Nino's midnight black eyes had once sent grown men cowering with a solitary glance. Now, those cold orbs were nothing more than a sunken abyss in the centre of a shattered reflection. "Or he knew something he shouldn't, and someone wanted to send a message."

**X x x**

**July 3rd, 2004; Las Vegas Crime Lab - Layout Room**

"Shot eight times through the mouth and the neck." Warrick tossed the coroner's report onto the table, where it slithered to an elegant halt in front of the woman. "I _know_ you know what that means."

"Somebody was trying to make sure he couldn't talk." Catherine nodded slowly, pursing her lips. "Mob hit?"

"No doubt." He agreed, ambling around the layout room table.

He had painted the wall with crime scene images and various handwritten notes about the victim, and Nino's stern expression now stared down at them from the centre of the bloody mural, his hollow gaze seeming to pierce straight through anybody who dared meet it.

"Nino Carmine worked for Tony Constantine way back in the day. He was connected to everybody who was anybody – including Sam." Warrick shot a sly glance in Catherine's direction before continuing. "There's been rumours for years that he was the one who shot Joey Acerbi In Times Square on New Year's Eve, 1958."

"Forget rumours." Cath instructed bluntly, electing to gloss over her father's potential involvement for the time being. "Do we know who killed him?"

"Oh, forget about it." He scoffed, tapping the wall with his knuckle. "A guy like this, half the mafia could be behind it."

"Oh." Cath echoed resignedly, picking up the folder and turning to the first page. Nino Carmine had once been an attractive, if not particularly striking, young man. But time had beaten his features into submission, leaving a trail of misery and loss etched into every line and crease. He may have died a wealthy man, but it was the sacrifices he had made along the way that rang true in his gnarled face.

After a depressingly long pause, she straightened up and gestured to the table full of exhibits. "Process and document. If nothing turns up in the database, shelve it. What with the heat and the strikes, we've got too many cases right now to focus on a dead-end."

"Yes ma'am." Warrick nodded, obediently beginning the laborious job of un-tacking and filing his carefully arranged images from the wall.

Catherine watched him for a second or two longer, drumming her fingertips on the bench. She had meant what she said – Las Vegas was days away from a full-scale crime wave if things in the city didn't settle down; but something about this case told her that it wasn't entirely unsolvable.

Leaving him to his work, she snatched up the report and sailed out; one last lead to follow before they tossed the case onto the scrap heap.

Warrick was almost finished packing the exhibits back into the box when something bright and jarringly familiar caught his eye.

"What the hell...?" He muttered to himself, lifting the bag to get a better look. "Well, I'll be damned."

He shook out the casino chip into a gloved palm and held it up to the light. It was a 1958 chip from the Sands – rare, and worth quite a mint. Although, given this man's career choice, he probably wasn't short of funds. He had more than likely kept it as a souvenir of his youth.

Still, Warrick mused as he slipped it back into the evidence bag and placed it carefully in the box, it had to have meant something for him to be carrying it around in his pocket over four decades later.

**X x x**

**July 3rd, 2004; Tangiers Casino**

No matter how many times she walked through those door, she always felt like she had been swept back twenty years. The Tangiers had that effortlessly timeless quality of 'Old Vegas' that had long since faded from the increasingly glossy Strip.

In here, she could lose herself in the past – _her_ past. Endless nights of dancing and drinking, locked inside faded walls that could tell a million secrets, if only you had the time to listen to them all.

At least once a week she told herself that she would leave this town and all its sin behind. She would go east, to Kansas or Nebraska. Or maybe even further south – Florida, where the sun shone all year round.

And then she'd come back in here. She would close her eyes, and feel the carefree atmosphere of the seventies seeping back into her veins; and she would remember why she could never leave, not really. This town was a part of her; she had lived it and now a tiny piece of it would always live inside her. In her dreams, and her nightmares, where she could still hear the voices clear as day - the smooth saxophones of the jazz band and the cheerful clinking of coins in ancient slot machines.

A gentle hand on her shoulder startled her, the memories quickly dissolving back to just that as she snapped her eyes open and whirled around to face the very man she had come to see.

"Sam." She breathed, switching instantly into CSI mode. "I need to talk to you."

"You can always talk to me, Muggs." He grinned, that grimacing unreadable grin that both endeared and terrified her.

"This is business." She asserted before he could get any other ideas. Sam rolled his eyes, dropping his hand sadly back to his side.

"Of course it is." He sighed. "Come on, you'd better come in and sit down."

X x x

"I knew Nino." He agreed, settling his bulky frame into the soft, well-worn leather. "Back when I was a floor manager, he worked the bar. That's where he first met Tony."

"Tony Constantine." Catherine confirmed. "Big time mafia boss."

"Please." Sam scoffed, staring morosely at the lonesome ice cubes melting in the bottom of his otherwise empty tumbler. "Tony was a pussycat compared to some of the guys back then."

"What about Nino?" She pressed. "Was he a pussycat, too?"

"Nino." Sam chuckled, shaking his head. "Nino was a character. He knew everybody's secrets, but no-one knew him. Not really."

"What does that mean?" She sat forwards, intrigued.

A waitress emerged, bathed in rouge from the tinted light hanging above their booth, with a fresh drink and a menu clasped in her perfectly manicured hands.

"Can I get you anything else, Mr Braun?" She asked in a sickeningly silky voice, bending forwards just enough to allow him a glimpse of her perfectly formed cleavage.

"I'm fine, thank you." He waved her away and she dutifully obliged, shooting a wary glance in Catherine's direction as she ducked out of sight. It was a look that the strawberry-blonde was used to receiving whenever she was around Sam's tag-along floozies, but it still left her feeling oddly unsettled whenever it happened.

Alone again, Sam took a long sip of his drink through a thin black straw, before fixing Catherine with the same intense gaze he'd held prior to their interruption.

"Nino played his cards close to his chest. He had a way of getting close to people without letting anybody get too close to him."

Cath nodded slowly in understanding, her eyes narrowing.

"Sounds familiar."

Sam bit back a bitter laugh.

"Muggs..."

"Thanks Sam." She stated coolly, sliding out of the booth. "I'll be in touch if I need anything else."

"Muggs, wait..." his hand shot out to grab her wrist tightly, earning him a shocked glare. "Just, promise me something."

"What is it?"

"Promise me you'll be careful. There are people out there who aren't going to like you asking these questions."

"It's my job to ask these questions." She pointed out, wrenching her arm free from his grip.

"Just be careful." He repeated earnestly, letting his own hand drop into his lap. "I know you don't trust me, but you're still my daughter and I don't want anything to happen to you."

She scrutinised him carefully, taking a stumbling step away from the table.

"Thanks, Sam." She repeated, refusing to let any air of concern slip into her voice even if it was written all over her face.

She left without looking back. She would return to the lab, check in with Warrick, pick up Lindsey from school and go home; where she would pretend to have an engaging conversation while the sullen pre-teen would pretend to eat her dinner.

But Sam's words would continue to plague her throughout the day, niggling and digging and making themselves a permanent little fixture in the back of her mind.


	3. July 3rd - July 4th 2004

**I should point out, anywhere the Italian isn't translated in the next couple of chapters is to put the readers in the character's shoes :)  
**

* * *

**July 3rd, 2004 [Evening]; Las Vegas Crime Lab**

"What do you think he meant by it?" Grissom cocked an eyebrow in mild concern as he sat back in his chair, the soft leather creaking with his subtle movements.

Catherine shifted and fidgeted awkwardly on the opposite side of the desk, her nervous blue eyes flitting anywhere but at his face. Gil's office, gloomy as ever, felt particularly claustrophobic today and everywhere her gaze fell there were dead, empty eyes staring back at her from inside jars and behind glass frames.

"I don't know." She threw her shoulders up helplessly, letting her strawberry-blonde waves fall in front of her face in an attempt to shield herself from his intense scrutiny. "I didn't stick around long enough to ask."

She had deliberated keeping her off-the-record meeting with Sam a secret, but after a sleepless day spent plagued by his parting comment, she had opted at last to confide in her old friend.  
He had only recently called her out on not informing him about Sam's cheque; and if anything were to happen to her now, at least he couldn't accuse her of hiding things from him – again.

"Have you noticed anything suspicious?" He pressed. "Any unusual cars on your street, anyone following you or Lindsey?"

"No, nothing." She shook her head. "But then, I haven't really been looking out for them."

She neglected to point out that she hadn't actually been home for more than a few hours at a time in over three weeks. It probably wouldn't help her case right now for him to know that she was practically living at work, lest she actually have to face up to her personal problems.

"Okay." Gil sighed, tenting his fingertips against his lips. "I'll make sure there's always one of the boys working the next few scenes with you, just in case. And if anything unusual happens – anything at all – you tell me straight away." He paused, tapping his chin in thought. "I'll call Brass and arrange for a uniformed officer to be stationed outside your house for a couple of days."

The obstinately defensive part of her wanted to rebut the idea, to tell him that she did not need guarding against her own father. However, one look at Gil's stern expression and she wisely chose to keep her mouth shut, offering only a blunt nod of acceptance.

Satisfied that she was not going to contest the directives, he mirrored her response and slipped his glasses on, turning his attention back to his computer screen.

For a painfully long moment, neither made any other movement.

"Is that it?" Cath enquired when the stuffy silence became too much for her to bear. He glanced up, giving her a casual once-over as if their last conversation had never happened.

"Well, was there something else?"

She rolled her eyes at his typical abruptness and heaved herself out of the seat. Heaven forbid he should actually have to offer comfort or friendly support every once in a while.

"No, that was it." She sighed, gesturing in the general direction of the break room; where the rest of the team were undoubtedly starting to get restless. "I'll ... uh, hand out assignments, shall I?"

"Would you?" He asked, his attention already absorbed in whatever fascinating and likely unrelated piece of literature he had found to distract himself from case reviews for the better part of the evening.

**X x x**

**July 3rd/4th, 2004; Nevada Desert**

Bobby had begged not to be the bearer of bad news, but his pleas had fallen on deaf ears; thus he found himself standing alone outside the rotting wooden door on this overcast night. Above him, the sky looked heavy and threatening, as if at any moment it would collapse under its own weight. Out here, away from the close muggy heat of the city, there was little protection from the elements and he shivered against a brief and sudden chill wind.

Raising a trembling hand, he knocked twice and nudged the brittle door open.

"Raymond?" He called out, stepping cautiously across the creaky floorboards.

There was a narrow crack in the panelled wall, just large enough to allow a strip of moonlight to seep inside; like the blade of a knife, severing the room in half.

"Cosi? Avete fatto?" [_So? Have you done it?_] A gruff voice enquired from the murky depths of the cavernous space.

It was pitch black, but for a small lamp burning away on the desk in the farthest corner. The dull light bulb flickered, casting deceptive shadows on the stony face staring back at him, making it impossible to determine the man's expression.

"Egli non rispondere i nostri messaggi." [_He's not answering our messages_] The young man explained meekly, a distinct tremor to his voice despite every effort to maintain his composure. "E da ieri, non sappiamo dove si trova."[_And as of yesterday, we don't know where he is_]

"Allora," [_Well then,_] the boss sat forwards and flexed both wrists until they cracked. "Dobbiamo essere piu chiaro nel nostro messaggio." [_We need to be clearer in our message_]

He stood up and drifted across the room in slow, calculated movements. He came to stop in front of the window and dragged a finger down the cracked, heavily stained pane of glass; examining it with distrust. The single-story building was decrepit, near squalid. But out in the middle of the desert, it was private and far enough away from the city that no one would stumble upon it by accident.

Out here, there was no one to witness their conversations but the bones of men who had long since run out of luck.

"Fammi uni dei ragazzi – il primogenito." [_Bring me one of the boys – the eldest_]

"Um," the younger man shifted uncomfortably, shuffling his feet across the dusty floor. "Non sara possibile. Sono ... sono raggiungibile." [_That won't be possible. They're ... they're unreachable_.] Sensing that the Raymond was not going to take too kindly to that news, he quickly added; "C'e una ragazza, anche se." [_There's a girl, though_]

The boss turned, his attention peaked once more.

"C'era una figlia?" [_There was a daughter?_]

"Si, lavora per la polizia." [_Yes, she works for the police_]

"Buona. Molto buona." [_Good. Very Good_] He whirled away from the window to face his young companion, the first hint of gratitude showing beneath his seemingly permanent frown. "Voglio che la regazza." [_I want the girl_]

"Lo mi occupero di esso." [_I'll take care of it_] Taking the order as an opportunity to get out of there, Bobby quickly scuttled back to the door, but a sharp holler stopped him in his tracks.

"No!" Raymond held up his hand, finally stepping out of the shadows into the narrow strip of light adorning the battered floorboards and revealing his weathered face. "Voglio che la ragazza portato qui – vivo." [_I want the girl brought here – alive_]

**X x x**

**July 4th, 2004; Las Vegas Crime Lab - Layout Room**

"Ogni eredità può rifiutare, ma sangue." Warrick's feeble attempt to get his tongue around the foreign words failed to shed any light on the obscure message and the trio continued to stare it at in bemusement.

"Where did you say you found this?" Grissom asked, extracting his glasses to read the note for himself; as if it might suddenly translate itself once the letters became clearer.

"It was stuffed in his top pocket." Warrick explained, pressing his palms into his tired eyes. "Mandy already ran prints – no dice. And there's nothing on the paper to identify where it might have come from."

While the men continued to scratch their heads over the peculiar piece of evidence, Catherine had relocated herself to the corner of the lab and was busy tapping away on a laptop.

"'Any legacy may refuse, but blood'." She recited, her narrowed eyes scanning the text twice to make sure she had typed it correctly. "It's Italian, apparently."

Grissom and Warrick glanced up, only noticing for the first time that she had wandered away from the table.

"What?"

"That's what is says." She clarified, ambling back towards them. "Depending whether you trust Google Translator, of course."

"'Any legacy may refuse, but blood'." Warrick repeated, turning the cryptic words over in his mouth. "What do you suppose that means."

"I don't know." Grissom frowned, clearly perplexed at the thought that their suspect had found a subject area in which he was not well versed.

"I suppose it means that you can't return your genes." Catherine guessed, resting her hands on the table top. "There are some things that are passed down through families that you might not be able to reject or walk away from."

"Huh." Warrick nodded. That would certainly not have been his first presumption, but since he didn't have a better answer he wasn't going to contest the woman's explanation. "So, you think this is some kind of message?"

"A message?" Grissom echoed, having finally caught on to the killer's deeper meaning. He lifted his gaze slowly to meet Catherine's face; and one look into her eyes told him that she too had worked out what the little piece of paper really was. "A threat."

**X x x**

She locked the car door, checking it twice before walking away. It was a habit she had developed years ago, a classic example of the kind of paranoia that creeps into your daily life when you spend every waking moment dealing with the scourge of society.

Slinging her bag over her shoulder, she made her way up the steps, stifling a yawn as she went. It had been a long shift, not in the least due to the flurry of rumours doings the rounds on the grapevine as a result of the dead mobster case and Sam Braun's peculiar warning.  
With each step she took, her feet seemed to get heavier and heavier, until she was practically dragging them to the front door. All she wanted to do right now was fall into bed and put those worrying thoughts out of her mind for a few meagre hours before she had to get up and do it all over again.

However, when she finally reached the front door, her whole body went cold.

It was already open. Someone had beaten her here.

Wide awake and alert now, she instinctively reached for her weapon and clicked the safety off. All appeared dark and undisturbed inside, but she wasn't taking any chances as she gently nudged the door open with her boot-clad foot and moved stealthily into the threshold. She half expected to find someone standing startled in front of her, but it was a tentative creak from behind that caught her attention.

She heard a soft, instantly recognisable click and her blood turned to ice.

"Solo che." A chilling voice muttered in her ear.

She shook her head to indicate that she didn't understand, but before a single word made it past her trembling lips a hand appeared over her mouth and she felt something cold and hard come down against the back of her skull.

Her last fleeting memory as she sank to the ground in a swirl of grey lights was the silhouette of a man standing above her and the heart-stopping fear settling in the pit of her stomach as she found herself staring up the barrel of a rifle.


	4. July 4th - July 5th 2004

**July 4****th****, 2004 (Evening); Las Vegas PD – Jim Brass' Office**

"So, nothing happened?" Brass quirked an eyebrow, sitting forward and fixing his subordinate with a sceptical glare. "Nobody snooping around, no unusual vehicles ... nothing?"

He knew from bitter experience that surveillance was one of the most loathed jobs for any police officer – it was eight hours in a confined space with a limited view and dull, monotonous conversation about the weather and recent sports results. If you hadn't punched your partner by the end of the shift, you must have the patience of a saint.  
But Officer Matson and his partner – a relatively new rookie, lurking quietly outside the glass-walled office – had been warned that if they slipped up on this task, they could kiss their careers goodbye.

"No, nothing." Matson assured him with a mildly frustrated sigh. "We were there all day and the most exciting thing we saw was two pigeons fighting over half a sandwich. Apparently, Ms Willows lives on one of the most boring streets in Las Vegas."

"Good." Brass nodded, blatantly ignoring the man's fractious sarcasm at being made to sit in a cramped car all day for no fruitful result. As far as the seasoned detective was concerned – and he was sure that Catherine would agree – 'boring' was perfectly adequate. He uncapped his pen and scrawled a half-hearted signature on the release form, thrusting it back into the cop's hand. "Now go away."

The police officer rolled his eyes at the abrupt dismissal and sloped back into the hallway, where his equally pissed off colleague was waiting impatiently for feedback.

Alone again, Jim allowed himself a few minutes reprieve to slump back in his seat and enjoy the rare peaceful quiet of his spacious office. He had a busy shift ahead and this could easily be the last chance he would get to sit down until daybreak. His first task, however, was to phone Grissom and inform him of the comforting news that, for now at least, Catherine and Lindsey did not appear to be in any immediate danger.

It didn't help them solve Nino Carmine's death, but it would settle a few fluttering nerves.

Figuring that there was no time like the present, he reached for the phone. However, just as his fingertips grazed its smooth surface, it rang.

Shaking away the momentary surprise, he snatched up the device.

"Brass."

He had expected it to be Gil himself, fishing for news. He expected wrong.

There was an achingly long pause as he rose autonomously out of his chair, all of the colour draining from his weathered face.

"When?!"

**X x x**

**Las Vegas Crime Lab – Break Room**

"Have you spoken to Sam yet?" Nick asked, handing the woman a mug of desperately-needed coffee, if her exhausted sighs and red-rimmed eyes were anything to go by.

"No." She moped, taking a long sip of the hot drink and savouring its rich, bitter taste for as long as possible. "I tried calling him, he's not answering."

"Well, whoever he thinks is after you, they'll have to go through us first." Warrick assured her with a friendly squeeze of the shoulder.

She attempted a smile, but even that proved too much effort and she settled for a grateful nod instead.

"He was probably just spouting off." She mused hopefully. "Whatever his connection to Nino, it doesn't have anything to do with me. He just likes to get under my skin."

"Catherine."

She visibly jumped at the stern voice; suggesting that yesterday's anxiety was still eating away at her, despite her previous statement.

They all turned to find the bulky frame of Jim Brass filling the doorway. Ordinarily unflappable, he looked unusually flustered today as he twisted the familiar gold watch restlessly around his wrist. His twitchy movements and narrowed blue eyes made it effortlessly clear that something was very wrong; and that fact alone set everyone else's teeth on edge. "Where's Grissom?"

"He's stuck in a meeting with the Undersheriff. We're expecting him any minute." Cath answered, a slight tremor in her voice as she picked up on the seething urgency bubbling just beneath the surface. "What's going on?"

"It's Sara," he exhaled. "She's missing."

X x x

The drop in temperature was almost palpable, as if a cool wind had enveloped the entire room and settled over it like a low fog; the kind that seeps into your very skin and chills you to the bone.

"Her neighbour called the police after finding her apartment door open and no sign of the owner." Brass repeated himself for the benefit of the newly arrived supervisor. "Responding officers found her car, bag, keys and cell phone; but there's no Sara." He paused, flicking his gaze from one concerned face to the next. "They also found blood in the threshold."

"Oh man." Warrick dragged a hand over his face.

"What about her weapon?" Nick asked, his foot tapping incessantly on the tiled floor seemingly beyond his control. "She wouldn't have left it here."

"No sign of it in her possessions," Brass noted, a tiny touch of hope entering his voice. "So that's something, I suppose."

"No." Cath shook her head, her voice barely audible over the sound of her heart pounding against her ribcage. "If she could have used it, she would have."

"So, what now?" Warrick asked, swiftly moving them away from the blonde's depressing statement. True as it may be, he really didn't want to go there yet.

"Grab Greg and go through all of her recent cases, see if anything stands out." Grissom instructed the dark-skinned CSI. "Catherine, you and Nick go to her apartment and see..."

"No." Cath cut him off. "I've got someone I want to talk to first."

Nick met her eye and a knowing look crossed his features.

"Sam?" He queried. "You don't think..."

She didn't answer at first, but her expression said it all. Her crystal blue eyes were glazed, almost opaque, and sunken into her sheet-white face; her lips so pale that they were barely visible against her deathly pale complexion.

"I don't know." She swallowed hard around the words, already moving towards the door on unstable legs. "But I'm going to find out."

**X x x**

**July 4****th****, 2004 (night); Tangiers Casino **

When she had left the breakroom, she had been shaken. Upon making it to the parking lot, she was determined. And by the time she abandoned the car outside the Tangiers Casino to the bemusement of the young valet, she was hell-bent on getting an answer.

There was no time for reminiscing on this visit as she stormed up to the front desk and slammed both hands on the counter, alarming the petite woman who was busily tapping away at a computer.

"I want to talk to Sam."

"I'm afraid Mr Braun is in a very important meeting and asked not to be disturbed." The receptionist recited dutifully, flicking her shoulder-length blonde hair over her shoulders with a perfectly manicured hand. "If you like, I can take a message..." Her expression slowly faded from boredom to dismay when it became apparent that Catherine was not willing to accept that answer. "Ma'am, I'm afraid you can't..."

But it was too late. By the time she had extracted herself from behind the cluttered desk; Cath had already cleared the reception area and was making a beeline for the stairwell. The security guard, upon catching a glimpse of her ID badge and that eerily familiar gaze, wisely stepped aside before she mowed him down.

Upstairs, she found her way to Sam's office with little problem and threw the heavy oak door open with a loud, attention-grabbing creak.

True to the receptionist's word, he was indeed in a meeting; but she barely spared his companions a glance as she tore between them and rounded the oversized desk.

"Where is she?" She demanded, getting in his face as much as was possible without sitting on him and jabbing a firm finger into his chest. "Who has her?"

Contrary to her rash actions, Sam remained perfectly composed as he lifted himself slowly from his seat, gripped Cath by the arm and guided her away from the gathered men.

"Catherine, you shouldn't be here." He spoke in a low, warning tone.

"Never mind me-" she shrugged him off roughly. "Two days ago you told me to watch my back, and now my colleague's gone missing."

"Tragic." He noted without a hint of sympathy. "But it's nothing to do with me."

She glanced around the room for the first time, taking in the sullen, scowling faces of the hulking men staring back at her. She hadn't considered what sort of meeting he could be having at this time of night, but it seemed patently obvious now.

"I don't believe it." She scrunched up her nose, taking a deliberate step out of his reach. "You're arranging security for yourself?"

"I'm taking precaution." He paraphrased. "Nino was a friend. I don't want to take any chances."

She scoffed, shaking her head in disbelief.

"Yeah, well I need to go find _my_ friend before it's too late." She spat. "And if I find out you had something to do with it, I swear to god..."

He cocked an eyebrow expectantly, but she left the threat hanging.

There was no doubt in her mind as she strode down the lengthy hallway, fighting back angry tears, that Sam knew more than he was letting on about Nino's death.

And her threat had not been an idle one – if she found anything that linked him to Sara's disappearance, she would make damn sure he did not slip through the net this time.

But first she had to find Sara, and she wasn't going to do that here.

**X x x**

**July 5****th****, 2004 (early hours); Nevada Desert**

It was stiflingly hot, as if even the world outside was struggling to breathe.

For a heart-stopping moment she thought that she had gone blind, before her blurry eyes started to adjust to the darkness. Even then, she still struggled to make anything out.  
Then again, there wasn't much to see; a poorly blacked-out window built into a wood panelled wall, a cracked once-white sink connected to a pipe that didn't go anywhere, and a door leading into a narrow hallway of seemingly never-ending blackness.

She tried to sit further upright, but found to her distress that she couldn't move. Her arms felt tight and heavy, forced uncomfortably behind her back. She was restrained. She tried to lift her head, but a shot of pain coursed down her spine at the move and she whimpered meekly.

That's when it came flooding back to her. The man, the gun, a bumpy car ride. The memories were faint and try as she might, she couldn't draw to mind a face.

She slowly managed to shift herself upright, finally managing to twist herself into a position that allowed her a little more movement. Her hands were chained to something metal and unmoving, something fixed to the wall. A radiator, perhaps. Every minor movement caused the heavy links to clang, causing an ominous echo to resonate around the empty space.

Or not so empty, she realised now; for she was not alone in the dingy room.

Beside her, sat on the only piece of furniture, a dark figure was scrutinising her silently. The only light between them emanated from the tiny red flame on the end of his cigarette.

"Who are you?" She asked hoarsely, attempting to turn her face towards him. It felt dull and heavy, as if it were full of mercury; and any movement, however small made her whole body cry out in pain. She could practically feel the bruises forming where she had been battered on her journey to whatever circle of hell this was. "Why are you doing this?"

"Non e nesessario sapere chi siamo."

She blinked in confusion. The words sounded almost familiar, but in her current foggy state she couldn't make any sense of them.

"What do you want from me?" She asked again, tears beginning to sting at her burning eyes. She didn't know if they were from the pain or the fear, or both. It didn't seem to matter, as her pleas fell on deaf ears.

"Vogliamo che lui."

"I ... I don't understand." She begged, tugging at the chains that were cutting fiercely into her slender wrists. "Please, just let me go."

She knew that she must sound pitiful, but she didn't really care. She was frightened and disorientated and she didn't know where the hell she was. She didn't even know how long she had been here. How long had he been sat in that rickety wooden chair, watching her drift helplessly between conscious realms?

The man vacated the precariously creaky seat and crouched down beside her. She couldn't help but flinch as he raised a hand to stub out his cigarette on the wall next to her face, exhaling a cloud of smoke into the scarce gap between them.

When he spoke, it was with a thick accent and a bitter drawl.

"I want the man who killed my father."


	5. New Year's Eve 1958

**New Years Eve, 1958; New York City**

The noise from the street was like a drum beat, thumping around the thin walls in a dull, repetitive rhythm. The atmosphere outside was almost tangible – even cooped up in this dingy, dank little flat; he could feel the excitement pulsing around the city.

He moved stealthily to the window and peered down into the street. It was a sea of colour, like a rainbow river flowing towards Times Square.

Turning around, he scanned his meagre surroundings. The fifth floor apartment was bare and depressing, but it suited his needs down to the ground. It was quiet, isolated and had a perfectly unobstructed view of Seventh Avenue.

Ambling back to the lone table at the far end of the room, he picked up the gun. He had chosen it especially for its size – small calibre, compact and easy to conceal. Beside it lay a box of untouched ammunition. Fifty lethal little bullets, but he would only need one.

Outside, shrieks of delight bounced off the high buildings as the revellers below prepared for what had been billed as a New Year to remember forever.

It was a night for celebration.

A night for vengeance.

X x x

Joseph threw his head back, releasing a booming laugh. His arm was slung protectively around a young woman's shoulders as they joined the ranks treading the iconic New York street towards The Great White Way.

With her midnight black hair and inquisitive blue orbs, Natalia had caught his eye instantly. At barely twenty years old, she was a few years younger than him and had a body that any woman would kill for. She was wild, fierce and could whip a man into shape with a single lash of her sharp tongue. It was love at first sight; and after only a few short weeks, he had proposed in lavish fashion over the most expensive bottle of champagne in the famous Toots Shor's restaurant.

Today was their wedding day.

"I want to get closer." She tugged him into the crowd, forcing her way to the centre of the action despite her diminutive stature.

He rolled his eyes, allowing himself to be dragged. He hadn't even wanted to come out on this cold and drizzly night. It was, after all, their wedding night. But she had insisted and he felt obliged to obey.

Having left the hotel late, for reasons that were still bringing a smile to his cracked lips, they had missed a lot of the festivity already, but she wasn't about to miss the biggest event of the year, no matter how amorous her new husband was feeling.

And Joseph Acerbi was a slave to only three things in his life: his cigars, his business and his woman.

X x x

He loaded the bullets into the weapon one by one, revelling in the gentle click each one made as it slid into place. Spinning the barrel, he grinned menacingly to himself in the dark.

"Perfetto." [_Perfect_]

Now he just had to wait, and watch.

Joseph was a man of habit, and he would be recognisable from five hundred paces away in his oversized fedora and extravagant fur-lined trench coat. Finding him would be an easy task.

He stared down at the weapon in his lap, stroking the cool metal with the palm of his calloused hand. His stomach was turning somersaults at the anticipation of what he was about to do; and the knowledge that he was doing it for the greater good.

Joseph was a fine man, but he was getting too big for his boots and it was only a matter of time before he overstepped the careful boundaries of business and cold-blooded murder.

The last thing the organisation needed was another Al Capone.

X x x

The jazzman on the hastily-erected stage swung down towards the ecstatic audience, the smooth brass of his saxophone twinkling under the glittering lights; though the sound of his music was barely even audible over the roar from the liquor-drenched crowd. Above them, a spotlight searched the street as a camera was beaming grainy real-time images of America's most talked about party around the country.

It would be several hours before word spread that Fulgenicio Batista – the overbearing dictator of Cuba – had fled his country in the face of the Cuban Revolution, but the celebration was already well under way.

The glistening road, wet from the earlier storm, was illuminated by the bright lights from above; the giant sign hanging above the Rialto reflected on every surface. Heels splashed through puddles and the cuffs of pants became sodden and heavy as they soaked up the rain, but nobody cared as they cheered and danced and raised drinks under the endlessly black sky.

It was just before midnight.

X x x

He strode purposefully down the boulevard, keeping his gaze low. The weapon tucked into his waistband felt conspicuous and he tugged self-consciously at the long jacket wrapped around him.

He had done this before, but never in the open. Never with so many spectators.

It was bitterly cold, but he seemed to be the only one who could feel it as the people around him twirled and swayed to an inaudible tune in only knee-length dresses and short-sleeved shirts.

High above, a large crystal ball began to descend from the heavens, emerging through the remaining wisps of cloud that were floating lazily across the otherwise clear winter sky. A chant began, resounding all around him, counting down from ten.

He paused, seeking a glimpse of his target in the tightly packed congregation.

"_Nine!"_

He continued on, forcing his way through unnoticed – a ghost in the masses.

"_Eight!"_

His hands were beginning to tremble as he reached inside his coat and extracted the weapon.

"_Seven!"_

His feet pounded on the pavement, splashing icy cold water up the sides of his innocuous black pants.

"_Six!"_

He spotted the man straight up ahead in his trademark attire, a line of smoke trailing from the stogie hanging between his grinning lips.

"_Five!"_

He came to a stop behind Joseph and swallowed hard, casting a glance at the people to his immediate left and right.

"_Four!"_

Nobody was watching him, their attention enamoured with the glitter ball dropping from on high. He held the weapon against his chest and clicked the safety off.

"_Three!"_

He raised it, taking a second to steady his grip.

"_Two!"_

His fingertip lightly brushed the trigger and he took a deep breath.

"_One!"_

The tip of the barrel was barely an inch from Joseph's neck.

"_Happy New Year!"_

A rolling explosion echoed all around the intersection as a clock began to strike the midnight hour and the dark sky ruptured into colour as the first fireworks burst in a flash of orange and yellow and red.

In the middle of the elated crowd, the sound of lady's shrill cry died amid the joyous cheer.

The gun clattered to the ground, its shooter already melting into a shield of people. Joseph Acerbi fell to his knees and emitted a final strangled gasp before slumping to the ground, blood soaking into the rich Canadian squirrel fur surrounding the collar of his coat and pooling on the wet stone; the deep red reflecting every colour of the spectrum from the fireworks and the glittering lights of Times Square.

**X x x**

**July 5****th****, 2004; Nevada Desert**

Sara tried to move, but the callous clanking of chains reminded her why it was an effort in vain.

She had realised by now what language he was speaking and managed to decipher a few stray sentences.

When she and her brothers were first learning to talk, her mother had only spoken in Italian and her father in English to ensure they learnt both languages simultaneously. But she hadn't spoken Italian in over ten years; even her mom had all but abandoned her mother tongue now.

She frowned in concentration, struggling to recall some of the words that lay long buried in her memory.

"Che cosa ... che cosa ha a che fare questo con me?" [What...what does this have to do with me?]

"Non si." [Not you] He breathed, sitting back in the creaky chair and crossing one leg stiffly over the other. "Il nonno." [Your grandfather]

"Nonno" She repeated softly, drawing to mind the image of a stern expression and piercing dark eyes. Sara had only ever met her grandfather a couple of times. She remembered him as a severe man with a hair-pin trigger temper. He had frightened her.

Could he have killed a man? Quite possibly, although how taking her hostage was supposed to attain revenge, she didn't quite understand

"Mi nonno?"[My grandfather?] She asked at last, probing for more details.

"Pochi mesi prima di morire, mio padre ha incontrato tre uomini." [A few months before he died, my father met with three men]. Her keeper explained hoarsely, spluttering out a tobacco-laden cough even as he extracted a lighter from his top pocket. "Credo che uno di quegli uomini ucciso." [I believe one of those men killed him]

"Nino Carmine?" She guessed.

She hadn't actually been working the dead gangster case, but the potential threats against Catherine had meant that she had picked up a fair few details through the grapevine.

"Egli era li." [He was there] The man confirmed. She had a feeling that she knew who the third man was, but she daren't mention his name lest they figure out _how_ she knew. Heaven forbid, Sam's warning should come to fruition and Catherine end up in this hell, too.

"Non ho vista mio nonno negli anni." [I haven't seen my grandfather in years] She pointed out instead, surprising herself by how easily the words were starting to flood back to her. "Non so nemmeno mi manca." [He won't even know I'm missing]

"Eglie sara,"[He will,] the man exhaled slowly, tapping his newly lit cigarette against his kneecap. "Poco." [Soon enough]

She watched the ash fall onto the rotten wooden floor with dismay, coming to the sad realisation that she was going to be here for some time.


	6. July 5th 2004

**As always, a big thanks to those reading and reviewing :)**

* * *

**July 5****th****, 2004; Las Vegas Crime Lab – 'Sara's Lab'**

There was a strange buzz around the lab on this unusually stormy evening; an atmosphere of discontent. By now, there wasn't a single person in the department unaware that a CSI was missing and that kind of news tended to create a feeling of unquenchable energy, like an adrenaline rush that you just couldn't burn off.

Having felt far too exposed working in the goldfish bowl that was the layout room, the graveyard shift had relocated and were now taking refuge in what had long since become dubbed 'Sara's lab'. They understood now why she preferred to work up here. It was quiet, well out of the way of the general foot-traffic. Still, they remained under constant scrutiny as every person wandering past the glass walls threw concerned glances their way, as if hoping to glimpse a key piece of evidence or a sign that they were making progress.

Unfortunately, progress was infuriatingly slow tonight.

"I've checked up on any cases Sara's worked in the past, anyone who may still have a cross to bear with her; but as far as I can tell they're all still either in prison or they're deceased." Grissom explained his curious absence all day. He had left the legwork to his team, preferring instead to mope around his office in stunned silence as he struggled to get his head around the disappearance of his most enigmatic criminalist. "What about you guys? Any luck?"

"We checked all of Sara's recent cases and there's nothing that stands out." Warrick exhaled in frustration, slamming his palms onto the table next to the impressive stack of folders comprising Sara's recent case load.  
The brunette had certainly been busy these last few weeks, even by her own impossibly high standards.

Beside him, Greg remained silent and twitchy as he flicked his wide eyes around the room. It was no secret that he had been aching to get in on a high-profile case for several months now, ever since Grissom indicated there may be an opportunity for him to move into the field.  
Now his chance was here, but it was just too close to the bone. What if he screwed up? What if he missed some vital piece of evidence and it cost Sara her life?  
He was out of his depth. She was his best friend, and he felt utterly at sea.

"Widen the time frame." Gil instructed bluntly, oblivious to the young man's inner turmoil. "What did her neighbours say?"

"Nothing much." Nick moaned, the futile efforts of the day visibly taking their toll on him. "Just that she was quiet, kept to herself and _never_ left the door unlocked. Nobody spoke to her on the morning she went missing, and no-one saw anything suspicious."

"Sounds about right." Catherine mused, shaking her head in despair. "So, we have nothing concrete to go on? What about security cameras from her apartment building?"

"Archie's checking the tapes now, but I wouldn't hold my breath." The Texan continued dejectedly. "They only cover the parking lot and the street."

"Well, keep looking. Maybe we'll get lucky." Grissom heaved a sigh, taking off his glasses and pinching the bridge of his nose with his thumb and forefinger. The man looked utterly drained as he pushed himself away from the bench and lumbered his weary frame towards the corridor. He paused in the doorway, nothing more than a hunched silhouette against the contrastingly bright lights outside the darkened room. "Brass is getting a subpoena to check her phone records and emails. In the meantime, go over all the evidence we've got from her apartment with a fine-toothed comb. They must have left a piece of themselves behind."

The last part was almost a desperate plea, a prayer for anyone who was listening to give them something useful to go on.

But Catherine hadn't even heard it. As his parting words filtered through the fog in her mind, she straightened up, wide-eyed with a sudden realisation.

"Oh, God." She groaned, slapping a hand to her forehead. "I can't believe I forgot!"

"What?" Nick frowned. Warrick reached out a hand to steady her sudden jerky movements but she moved out of his reach.

"It was a few weeks ago, I ... I was working with Sara and, she got a phone call." She babbled, wringing her hands anxiously in front of her. "Except _she_ didn't actually get it..."

**X x x **

**March 19****th****, 2004; Las Vegas Crime Lab**

If Catherine was aware that Sara was ignoring her, it didn't stop her from voicing her thoughts on the puzzling case.

Camped out on opposite sides of the room, the two women had both become deeply enamoured with their own tasks and the heavy silence hanging between them was only exasperated by the peculiar calm that had settled over the lab tonight. Ultimately – as was usually the case – the lack of background noise got to Cath long before Sara and she felt the undying urge to rectify the situation with idle chat.

Sara hummed intermittently in agreement, humouring the strawberry-blonde's need to fill the silence with random pieces of information and unhelpful rhetorical questions.

"If there is a connection between the two victims, we can presume it's not through the wives; since one was a housewife and the other a high-flying lawyer. The husbands could be connected through their business links, although that still doesn't lead us to a motive." She rattled off, her gaze never leaving the many, many pages of DNA results Greg had so cheerfully handed her.  
"And we still don't know the relevance of the Walker's residence."

Finally, something broke through Sara's wall of concentration and she looked up.

"Walker?" She repeated.

"Yeah, they own the house where the victim's car was parked." Cath explained. "Of course it's entirely possible that the killer took the car and parked it there at random to throw us off, but..."

"I'll be right back." Sara interrupted, a twinkle of recognition flashing across her eye as she hopped off the stool and scuttled out of the room.

"Okay." Catherine agreed, watching her disappear with a small frown. Shrugging it off, she returned her attention to her notes and resumed the absent chewing on her pen to deal with the lonely silence of the unseemly quiet lab.

Thankfully, she didn't have to bear it for too long before the trilling of a cell phone shattered the peace. She glanced up, watching the device vibrate across the table top.

Her own phone was still clipped to her belt, so it must be Sara's.

Instinctively, she knew that she should leave it to go to voicemail and let Sara deal with it when she got back, but curiosity got the better of her and she snatched it up, squinting at the little screen.

Dylan

She didn't know anyone called Dylan. It certainly wasn't someone from work. There was no surname, so she could presume it was not a witness or somebody else connected to a case.

Realising that it was likely a personal call, she was about to let it ring out, when it dawned on her that it was nearly 3am. What if it was important? What if something had happened that Sara needed to know about?  
Squashing the little voice in her head telling her that it was wrong to pry, she answered it.

"Hello, S..."

"Hey, I got your message." A throaty male voice jumped in before she could finish the introduction. "And I'm going to tell you what I already told Seth. We are not touching that money. If you need cash, find it somewhere else, because I'm not signing anything."

"Hey, listen," she tried to interject, but he cut her off abruptly. He was slurring, so much so that she could almost smell the whisky and cannabis drifting down the phone line with every bitter word he spat.

"No, you listen sis. You have no idea about the kind of hell you're going to unleash if you access that money. We are not going to open that can of worms! If you need help, get a fucking loan like everyone else!"

"Uh, I don't think..."

"Oh, and Sar." He continued, oblivious to her continued attempts to stop him. "Don't sit at the same table for dinner every night. You never know who might be watching you."

With that endearing sentiment, the line went dead.

Catherine stared at the phone for a long moment, before carefully snapping it shut and replacing it on the table.

Sara needed money.

But who was he? He had called her 'sis'. She supposed it could just be a nickname, but the more likely explanation was that Sara had gone to her brother for help, and he had slammed the door in her face.

So, who was this Seth guy? And, more importantly, why was Sara so desperate for money that she was willing to 'unleash hell', to coin a term.

Catherine didn't have time to process these questions ringing in her ears before the very woman came back in, a sheepish smile dancing on her lips.

"Sorry about that, I got held up." Sara explained, throwing her hands up. "Hodges caught me."

If she noticed the look of concern on Catherine's face, she didn't react to it as she slid a document across the table towards the senior CSI.

"It's okay." Cath frowned, studying her partner carefully. Sara had lost weight lately. She hadn't noticed it until now, but it seemed so obvious under the harsh lights. And she was tired. "Hey," she called softly, reaching out a tentative hand. "Is everything okay?"

"Yeah." Sara blinked, surprised by her supervisor's apparent lack of interest in the information she was offering. "Why wouldn't it be?"

Cath shifted, unable to come up with a valid response that didn't give her away.

"You just seem ... stressed, lately." She settled on at last. "You know, if you ever need anything, my door is always open."

Sara nodded slowly, perplexed by the unusual offer.

"Thanks." She agreed carefully. "I ... um, I found a connection between our victim and the address you mentioned."

Picking up on the younger woman's unadulterated attempt to change the subject, she moved around the table to see this new lead in their case.

A part of her debated telling Sara about the call, but she quickly decided against it. If Sara had wanted them to know, she would have told them herself.

And besides, she shouldn't really have answered her colleague's phone anyway.

**X x x**

**July 5****th****, 2004 – Las Vegas Crime Lab - 'Sara's Lab'  
**

"Did you ask her about it?" Nick pressed urgently.

"Of course not. How could I?" Cath shrugged, clawing her hands through her hair. "I should never have answered it in the first place. I thought once I told her, that she would shut down on me; especially with it being such a personal matter."

"Yeah, but about money?" Warrick clarified. "Do you think she's in some kind of trouble?"

"I don't know. It certainly sounded that way. I tried for days to get her to open up to me, but she wouldn't crack."

"Well, why the hell didn't you tell us about it?" Nick demanded, slamming his fist onto the table in a wincing crack.

"I..." She shook her head mutely. Honestly, she didn't have an answer for that. She supposed, deep down, she hadn't told them out of loyalty to Sara's privacy – not that that meant a great deal now, given the circumstances.

"Now, hold up." Warrick reigned his irate friend in with a firm hand on his shoulder. "Do you know the exact date of that phone call?"

"I could look it up." Cath nodded, blinking back fretful tears. "I know what we were working on at the time, so it'll be in my notes. Why?"

"Because if Brass gets the warrant to check her phone records, we can find out where that call was coming from and track down this 'Dylan' guy. If he is her brother, he might know what's going on."

"Why do we need to wait for the warrant?" Greg piped up. "We've got her cell phone in evidence. Can't we just trace the call from that?"

There was a few seconds where the seasoned CSIs all stared at the young lab tech in surprise, before his intelligent suggestion spurred them into action.

"I'll grab Archie and tell him to set up the computer to do a cell site analysis." Nick asserted, gesturing for Greg to retrieve the cell phone from the evidence vault.

"I'll fill Grissom in." Catherine added, sweeping her notes into a haphazard pile.

The three of them scuttled out in opposite directions, glad to finally have some leads to follow. Alone in the wake of their hurried departure, Warrick rested his whole weight against the table, shaking his head slowly in loss.

"Damn girl." He sighed, picking up the photograph of Sara from the centre of the table and dragging the pad of his thumb across its glossy surface affectionately. "What kind of mess have you gotten yourself in to?"


	7. December 18th 1964

**All flashbacks in this one, but they will (hopefully, if I've planned it right) fall into place soon.**

* * *

**December 18th, 1964 - - New York City**

"What am I doing?" She asked herself for the millionth time, attempting to straighten out the invisible creases in her dress. It was far too cold to be wearing such a flimsy garment, but she thought it might make her appear more innocent, more pure. Given the information she was about to divulge – and who she was sharing it with – that could only work in her favour.

Outside, wispy snowflakes were fluttering past the grimy window and settling in a fine dust on the litter-strewn Brooklyn street. She shivered against her will, wrapping her slender arms around her body in an attempt to convince herself that it was only due to the cold.

She saw him coming long before he arrived, striding down the street as if he didn't have a care in the world; his hands stuffed in the pockets of his knee-length midnight-black coat and a cigarette hanging out of his mouth. His shoulder-length brown hair was blowing in the bracing afternoon breeze beneath a familiar silk-lined fedora.

He looked far too relaxed given the nature of his career and the current political situation. Thanks to Joseph Valachi testifying live on air last year, the Feds were hot on the heels of every major gangster in America. Of course, her father knew how to cover his tracks.  
She knew that from bitter experience.

If she hadn't already been seated she would have likely fallen over, as her knees turned to jelly as soon as she saw him advance. She took several quick mouthfuls of her drink just to settle the butterflies in her stomach. Or drown them, whichever worked fastest.

Angelo Valentino was a man who had always enjoyed making an entrance, and today was no exception. He threw the cafe door open and sailed into the dingy space as if it were his castle. For a moment he just stood, his weight on one hip, scouring the dank meeting place with his dark eyes until he finally caught sight of her huddled by the window.

His face lip up and he approached quickly, his strong arms outspread. Reluctantly, she rose to greet him.

"Laura." He beamed, dragging her into a hug and pressing a kiss to her temple. She had always felt smothered in his embraces, so much larger was he. At barely 19, she was slight and delicate in comparison to his well-built and looming frame.  
"Mi figlia," [My daughter] he cooed. Breaking apart, they both slid into the booth and took a moment to study each other.

She shifted, winding her arms around herself tightly as if trying to keep from falling apart.

"Papa." She attempted a smile, but the result was more of a nervous grimace.

"I'm glad that you wanted to meet." He reached across the table and she grudgingly mimicked his movements and placed her tiny hands inside his.

"Papa." She repeated shakily. "I wanted to talk to you about something very important. I don't want us to fight anymore. I want to make amends."

"Mi figlia." He shook his head, stretching across the gap to place a finger over her pouting lips. "You don't have to say anything. The fact that you're here is enough for me. We'll go home; and forget all this mess." He gestured to their pitiful surroundings. "Forget all about _him_. Come home, bella."

She pulled her hands back, realising that he had made a grave mistake. In her message, she had said only that something had happened involving Max and she needed to talk. He had obviously misunderstood her motive for this meeting.

"No, I'm not coming home." She corrected him carefully. "I came to tell you that..."

"Laura?" He urged, his dark eyes pleading and warm. She took a deep breath and straightened up in her seat, trying and failing to make herself feel bigger.

"I'm pregnant."

The word fell between them like a stone. For a long minute, he just stared.

"I'm going to have a baby, papa."

Finally, he lifted his gaze towards the ceiling and took a slow, deep breath; before bringing his fist down on the table in anger.

"Bastardo!" He snarled. "You let that man touch you!"

"Max is a good man, padre." She insisted, tears welling up in eyes at the shock of his violent response. "He cares for me, and he'll care for the baby too."

Without warning, she felt a sharp stinging on her face and recoiled at the slap.

"Battona." [Whore] He hissed acidly.

By now, people had noticed the fight brewing in the shadowy corner and begun to slink away. Nobody would interfere – nobody dared. Even in this slum-dog neighbourhood, everyone knew to be afraid of the name Angelo Valentino.

"I'll kill him." He growled in fury, already making to leave.

She stood up, one hand still plastered to her face, and caught him by the sleeve.

"No!" She begged. "He's a good man. He's going to do right by me."

"I won't hear of it! You're coming home." He yanked her roughly out of the seat, but she resisted fiercely

"No!" Her dark eyes – so like his own – flashed with fear and rage. "No, you wouldn't do that. You wouldn't make an orphan of your grandchild – tuo nipote."

For the first time, his features softened. He took off his hat and dragged a hand through his long hair before replacing it.

"Oy." He exhaled, sinking back onto the worn leather. Cautiously, she followed suit and waited for his answer. "Laura ... where are you going to raise this child?"

"Max has an apartment." She explained. "He's got a job; he's going to take care of us."

"As a grocery boy?" Angelo scoffed. "How?"

"We'll manage." She shrugged. "We've managed on our own so far."

She neglected to mention why they had managed – why they had had to manage.  
Why, fed up with her constant rebellion, her own father had hit her so hard that she had run away at the tender age of eighteen, with a fractured wrist and a black eye for souvenirs.

As it happened she didn't need to mention it; Angelo's sheepish expression seemed to suggest that her point had registered anyway. He nodded slowly, chewing on the inside of his cheek.

"You swear this man will take care of you. Both of you?"

"Always." She nodded earnestly. "Papa, I want my child to know his father _and _his grandpa."

Slowly, she saw him start to melt and shrunk with relief.

"If it's a boy, I'll name him after you." She bargained playfully, dragging a smile from the temperamental old man.

"Oh, mi bella figlia." [My beautiful daughter] He sighed, dragging her around the booth into a hug and dropping a kiss into her silky hair. "Oy. What _have_ you gotten yourself into?"

**X x x**

**December 18****th****, 1964 - - Las Vegas**

The sound of tiny feet greeted him at the door and he glanced down to find a little red-haired whirlwind scampering towards him.

"Muggs!" He grinned, scooping her up and swinging her easily onto his hip.

"Sam!" She snuggled against him for a hug, threading her tiny arms around his thick neck.

"How's my girl?" He asked, bouncing her gently and nuzzling against her thick wavy hair.

"Sam." Another voice echoed in a clipped tone, as Lily materialised out of the kitchen; drawn out by the commotion. Sam placed Catherine back on the floor and straightened up.

"Hi Lil." He greeted hoarsely. When she continued to appraise him from a distance, he took a step towards her.

"Don't." She held up her hands, in which were clutched a pair of scissors and a roll of tape.

That was the first time he spotted the many stacks of plain cardboard boxes littering the small apartment. Without decoration, it seemed so sparse and depressing.

"You were really serious, huh?" He noted sorrowfully.

"I have to do this, Sam." She insisted, dropping unceremoniously onto the arm of a couch. He couldn't help but notice that she looked worn out, beads of sweat gathering on her ivory skin from the strenuous effort of packing up her life. "I can't stay here like this."

"I told you," he cleared the room in a couple of paces, crouching down by her side and gripping her hand before she could retreat. "I can give you anything you need. I'll make sure you never struggle."

"Oh yeah? And what about _her_?" She challenged, gesturing to the child; who continued to watch her parents with trepidation.

"Catherine, too. She'll never want for anything."

"It's not that simple, Sam." Lily shook her head, tears beginning to spill down her cheeks. "Catherine and I, we need more than just idle promises."

"Hey," he pressed a finger to her chin and forced her to meet his eye. "I'll always look after you, that's not an idle promise."

She stood up, moving out of his reach, and began to pace. Her arms were wrapped around her stomach, holding herself together.

"So, come with us." She offered at last, a touch of hope behind the cold front.

"I can't." He snapped, refusing to get sucked into this argument again. "You know what's going down in New York – Valachi's little stunt has caused untold trouble for ... for everyone. The Feds could be moving here next. If I leave town, it could look like I've got something to hide."

"Do you?"

He deflected the question, training his blue eyes back on their baby daughter.

"Look at her." He sighed. "Can you really drag her away from her life here? Away from all she knows?"

Catherine was staring back at him in silence, dragging her tiny sock-covered foot across the chipped wooden floorboards.

"I don't know, Sam." Lily confessed. "I don't know what's the right thing to do. But I also don't think I can stay here. Not unless you're willing to give up certain things for us."

He acknowledged with a sigh that she wasn't taking about his marriage.

"You know the kind of work I do." He held out his hands. "You know who I work with."

She dropped her head, realising now where she stood in his priorities and accepting them with a sad nod.

"Why did you come here, Sam?" She asked quietly. "Go home to your wife."

"Not until you promise you're not leaving."

"I can't do that Sam." She pursed her lips, pressing her back against the bare wall behind her.

"I don't understand." He scowled, getting increasingly irritated by her refusal to give him a straight answer. "What's suddenly changed? Why can't we just carry on as before?"

"Because we can't!" She erupted, taking gasping breaths between each distressed word. "Because nothing's the same. I'm pregnant Sam! I'm pregnant!"

He stared at her, his eyes like saucers. He searched her body, as if he could deduce who the father was simply by looking close enough.

Finally, without so much as another word, he spun on his designer Italian heels and strode back across the apartment.

"Sam!" Lily hollered after him, but he didn't stop until he reached the door.

While fumbling with the handle, he felt a small tug at his shirt and glanced down to see Catherine blinking up at him in confusion and sadness. Looking into her ocean blue eyes, he could almost see himself staring back; but even that wasn't enough to overcome his betrayal.

With a gentle push, he extracted the child from himself and left the apartment in silence. Despondent, the little girl watched the door slam shut through unshed tears.

Lily had sunk to the floor, where she now curled against the wall while heartfelt sobs wrenched their way from her heaving chest. She squeezed her eyes tight closed, trying to shut out the pain of his abandonment.

Somewhere above the sound of her own cries, she heard a soft sniffle and felt a weight against her shoulder. She lifted her head enough to see that Catherine had settled next to her and was attempting to crawl under her arm. Lily unfurled herself and lifted the five-year-old into her lap.

"Momma?" She questioned softly, nestling under her chin. "Where are we going to live?"

Lily sniffed, attempting to wipe away her tears; but with every swipe of her fingers, more quickly replaced them.

"I don't know, sweetheart." She pressed a kiss against her daughter's hair, pulling her as tight as she dared into the protective curve of her body. "But I'll think of something. We'll get through, somehow."

The God's honest truth was that she didn't know how they were going to get through. With a small child and another on the way, a showgirl's salary just wasn't going to cut it.

She was scared for herself, and for Catherine. Sam was right about one thing, Las Vegas could be about to get very dangerous for the likes of him. And if were to suddenly go away for a while, she would be totally lost – which is why she had to leave first.

She didn't know how she had gotten them into this mess, but her children were counting on her to get them out of it.


	8. July 5th - July 6th 2004

**July 5****th****, 2004 - - CSI, Break room**

"_The death of Nino Carmine has raised some serious questions about the mafia influence in this city."_ Rory Atwater declared, his steely gaze shifting expertly from one camera to another. _"Las Vegas was built by the mob and that remains a valuable part of its history. But times have changed, and I am not going to stand by and allow them to take liberties in _my_ city."_

"Way to go, Sheriff." Warrick droned dolefully. "Give them a challenge, why don't you?"

"_As of today,"_ Atwater continued, puffing his chest out in his pristine jet-black suit; _"LVPD is waging war on organised crime in Las Vegas."_

"Turn it off." Catherine sighed into the table, her hands submerged in her stressed red locks.

Nick willingly obliged, snatching up the remote and silencing the pretentious speech. It would come as little surprise that Atwater had political ambitions, given the way he held the press in the palm of his hands.

"Fifteen minutes and not a single word about Sara." Nick scoffed angrily, gesticulating to the TV with an angry flick of his wrist. "What the hell?"

"Forget it, Nicky." Cath pushed herself to her feet and sloped towards the coffee pot. It was only the beginning of shift and this was already her third cup. That was a bad sign in itself. "It wouldn't make a difference. Whoever has her is obviously flying under the radar. You saw the CCTV footage – black car, tinted windows, no licence plates..."

"Yeah, well I don't care." He spat sullenly. "Why the hell should we focus on some dead scumbag gangster when she's still missing?"

"We're not focusing on it." Warrick assured him. "We're going to find her. We just need to focus on the evidence."

"What evidence? We've got nothing!"

Launching the remote onto the centre bench, he whirled around and landed a kick squarely in the centre of the trashcan, booting it across the hallway in his frustration.

"Nick!" Warrick yelled, slamming his own drink down and taking a step towards his mate; but the younger CSI was already on his way out of the break room. In the wake of his abrupt departure, Rick dropped heavily onto the couch and emitted a depressed groan.

Catherine, idly stirring her coffee with the wrong end of a spoon, continued to stare at the floor where the remote had come to a sliding halt after skittering across the table top. Finally, she placed the mug down untouched.

"I'm going back to her flat." She asserted. "Maybe we missed something."

"You sure that's a good idea?" Warrick asked gently. His concern for the assistant supervisor had been growing markedly with each passing hour that Sara was gone, but he knew better than to voice his worries to her.

"I don't know." She acknowledged, throwing her hands out to the sides. "But I can't just sit around here and watch Nick trash the place."

**X x x**

**July 5****th****, 2004 - - LVPD**

Oblivious to the Sheriff's media frenzy taking place outside; Jim Brass' captive audience was silent and sombre as they all stared down at a photocopied image of an all too-familiar face.

"Sara Sidle has been missing for approximately thirty hours." The detective declared bluntly to a murmur of concern from the room full of uniformed men and women. "Her apartment showed signs of a break in, but there's no evidence that anything was taken, or that she actually made it past the threshold on the morning she disappeared."

One of the officers raised his hand.

"Does she have any known enemies?" He asked dutifully, knowing that someone had to breech the possibility and deciding that it may as well be him.

"CSI have checked her recent cases, nothing stands out but we're keeping an open mind."

"Any partners or ex-partners that might be involved?" Another cop chipped in. It was a well-known fact that most violent crimes were committed by people known to the victim. Sad, but true all the same.

"None that we know of." Jim shook his head.

It had been the first thing he'd checked, too; and he'd almost been grateful to discover that it was an unlikely scenario. Sara trusted so few people in her life – the thought that one of them could be responsible for hurting her, it made his blood boil.

"I want you all to be thorough. CCTV footage, traffic stops ... anything remotely suspicious, I want you to come to me first." He continued earnestly, to a round of consenting nods around the room.

"Where do you want me?" Officer Mitchell broke away from the crowd and straightened up. The stalwart cop had worked many scenes with Sara over the years; it figured that he'd want a prominent role in trying to locate her.

"Door-to-door." Brass instructed, handing him a pre-printed list of suspects to start with. Unlikely, yes; but it was somewhere to start. Turning his attention back to his team, he delivered a final message with unwavering sincerity despite the distinctive tremor to his bottom lip.

"From this day onwards, we don't sleep until we've found her."

X x x

**July 5****th**** – 6****th****, 2004 - - Sara Sidle's Apartment**

Glad of any opportunity to escape the brewing tension between Nick and Warrick, Greg had eagerly agreed to accompany Catherine on this expedition. However, now he was here he began to feel uneasy.

The last time CSI were at this scene they had focused their attention on the threshold and the hallway, since that was where all the action appeared to have occurred. The evidence suggested that the intruders hadn't even entered the apartment, beyond breaking the lock on the door.

There had also been a part of them that hadn't felt right rooting through their colleague's personal life; but they were running out of alternative options now. Today, they had to dig deeper.

Cath broke the garish yellow seal covering the door and stepped inside, taking a shuddering breath as she scrutinised the place.

It had initially surprised her that the brunette was still living in a studio flat. Granted, they were not on the highest wages in the department by any means; but that wasn't to say that they were destitute. Nick had a single-story two bedroom house, and even Warrick had walls between his kitchen and his bedroom.

Perhaps Sara just liked the small space, or the lack of other rooms to clean, she had mused. But it did give credence to the idea that she was struggling financially.

"I'm going to check her desk." She announced, moving past the faux-leather sofas to the far corner; where Sara appeared to have erected a miniature office space. With any luck she would find a bank statement or an invoice; something that might suggest why the girl was so desperate for money that she would call on her deadbeat brother for help.

She scanned the colourful multitude of files and folders adorning the shelf above the table, studying each hand-written label in turn. There was a distinctive gap between Accounts and Bills, but a quick search of the desk proved fruitless.  
It did, however, lead her to locate an A5-sized ring-bound book with a standard flower design and delicate font daubed across the cover. It wasn't what she was looking for, but it was interesting.

"I found her address book." She stated; flicking through it until she landed on 'S'. There was no Dylan, but all wasn't lost. "Seth Sidle."

"Who's that?" Greg inquired.

"I don't know." She pursed her lips. "The guy on the phone mentioned someone called Seth."

"Could be another brother." He hypothesised with a shrug.

"Yeah." She agreed quietly, placing it back on the edge of the desk.

So far they had put off contacting her family, but the longer Sara was missing the more pressing that duty became. And, knowing Grissom like she did, she had a horrible feeling that task was going to fall squarely into her hands.

She turned her attention back to the bookcase and briefly studied the titles.  
Clearly, Sara had rather an eclectic taste in reading. And music, for that matter. Catherine slid a couple of CDs off the shelf and studied the back of the cases. She had never even heard of half these artists.  
She was going to have to widen her field a little.

On the shelf below was a large dark wood picture frame, bordering the faded image of a little girl with waist-length dark hair sat at a piano. Catherine smiled tearfully, dragging her thumb across the photograph. Sara was a sullen little thing, even back then.  
Replacing the frame carefully on the bookcase, she turned her attention to the rest of the apartment.

Beside her, propped up against the yellow satin, floor-length drapes, sat a beautiful sea-green acoustic guitar. She strummed the strings once, letting the gentle wooden sound reverberate through her fingertips and into her body.

"Did you know that she played?" She asked of the lab tech.

"Guitar? Yeah, she mentioned it once." He nodded, swallowing hard around the lump that had suddenly appeared in his throat. "She always said that she'd show me one day."

Cath turned, catching his sad gaze across the tiny flat.

"She will." It was a timid promise, but one that added an air of hope to the poignant mood. Greg nodded, turning away before the woman could catch sight of the tears welling up in his eyes.

Sensing that he needed a minute, she wandered over to the chest and began apathetically opening drawers at random. Trailing a hand across the neatly folded t-shirts, she settled on one and pulled it out. It was a long-sleeved mottled grey top that Cath vaguely recalled seeing her wear once or twice. Holding it up to her face, she inhaled the familiar scent of her friend and bit back a sob.

"Hey," Greg called, snapping her back to the room. She spun around to find him frowning at her, his head tipped to one side. "Do you hear that?"

She returned the garment to its home and listened too. It was faint, but she could definitely hear something.

"Scratching?" She scowled, examining the room for the source.

"There," Greg pointed to the balcony. Outside, barely visible between the white sheer curtains, a tiny squirrel was clawing pitifully at the door. Before Catherine could warn him not to, he had slid the panel open and the little creature strutted inside, emitting a disgruntled chirrup at being kept waiting.

To their shock, he scampered straight across the room and onto the kitchen unit. When they continued to stare at him, he expertly knocked the lid off a ceramic pot and emitted an angry squeak.

Walking over, Greg peered inside to see what had the animal so worked up.

"Peanuts!" He exclaimed with surprise, lifting up the bag to show her. "Sara must have fed him."

"Of course she did." Catherine rolled her eyes, watching as Greg shook a couple of the treats onto the counter. The squirrel munched contentedly on them, before looking up expectantly for more. This time he placed them in his hand and grinned when the rodent happily ate from him, clutching his fingers with its own tiny claws.

Catherine reached out to stroke his furry little head tentatively with her fingertip.

"Well I'm sorry little guy, Sara's not here right now. But I promise we're doing everything we can to get her back."

He chirped and clicked, eyeing the strangers curiously for a second before launching himself onto the floor and sniffing around the sofa. Perhaps trying to deduce for himself where his regular owner was.

"I thought her building didn't allow pets." Greg noted with a hint of amusement.

"Yeah," Cath snorted derisively. "Like that would stop her."

As the creature scratched around the furniture, Greg spotted something propped up next to the couch leg and crouched down for a better look. Whatever it was must have slipped down there from the arm of the sofa, suggesting Sara had had it out recently.

"Hey Catherine," He enquired, extracting the item. "Is this what you were looking for?"

She accepted the folder, turning it over to read the label.

"Bank statements." She breathed. "Good find, Greg."

"Hey, it wasn't me." He grinned, nodding at their furry little companion pointedly. "I guess there's a reason she kept him around."

X x x

**July 6****th****, 2004 - - CSI; Grissom's office**

Grissom nearly left his seat in surprise as a sheaf of paperwork landed unceremoniously on his desk.

"Sara was paying nearly $900 a week to the same bank account." Catherine announced, placing her hands on her hip. Gil quirked an eyebrow in surprise, snatching up the stapled pile of statements to peruse.

"Do we know whose account this is?"

"Not yet, we only know it's not one of her own. Nick's looking into it now." She sank into a chair opposite him. "It does explain why she's struggling through. Her salary won't cover that as well as her rent and bills."

"No, not even close." He acknowledged sadly, taking off his glasses and rubbing the bridge of his nose. It pained him to think that Sara had been going through tough times and he had been utterly oblivious to it.  
"Catherine, did we miss something?" He asked weakly. "Was there some sign that she was in trouble, and I just didn't notice?"

"Honestly Gil," she threw her head back towards the ceiling, her chest heaving. "I don't know. I've been trying to figure that out myself. But, looking at those bills, she's been paying nominal amounts into that account since she came to Vegas. Maybe we never noticed because she's always just got on with it until now."

"Maybe." He agreed uncertainly, casting his gaze over the numbers again until they all blurred into a checkerboard of illegible black and white on the page. "Where is she, Cath?" He exhaled. "Who has her?"

"I don't know." She murmured, feeling the words catch in her throat. "We're going to find her though. We're not going to let anything happen to her."

He looked up, his haunted gaze burrowing through her skin and into her very soul. There had been a question playing on her mind ever since this hell started, that she hadn't dared admit out loud, or even in her head yet.  
But Gil voiced it now, as if he could see the very words dancing behind the doubt in her eyes.

"What if it already has?"


	9. July 7th - July 8th 2004

**Don't worry, they **_**are**_** going to catch a break in the next chapter :)**

* * *

**July 7****th****, 2004 - - Crime Lab**

"Sara has been paying _$875 _a _week_ into another bank account." Nick explained, to an incredulous gasp from Warrick. "But I can't get anyone at the bank to tell me who it belongs to, or even how long it's been open." The frustration in the Texan's voice was palpable as he slammed his fists onto the table top.

"Well, keep trying." Grissom urged. "That money could lead us to whoever has her."

A range of potential motives flashed silently through their collective mind: blackmail, drugs, gambling...but then they cast their eyes over the photo of their missing friend still tacked to the wall, and those theories dissolved into the heavy air once again.  
If Sara was being blackmailed, she would have told them. And she certainly wasn't the type to get mixed up in drugs or gambling. In any case, they would have surely noticed if something that troubling was going on in their co-worker's life.

Which ultimately brought them back to that gallingly incomprehensible question: why was Sara parting with so much money every week? And where the hell was she getting all this extra money from?

Gil turned his attention to Catherine, who until now had been lurking quietly by the door in the hopes that she would evade notice.

"Have you contacted her family yet?"

"No, that's my next job." She confessed sadly, her heart sinking at the very thought of it. "I've already tried calling Dylan, but he's not picking up. I'm going to try the number for Seth Sidle next."

"What about her parents?"

"There are no details for them in her address book or her personnel file." Cath shrugged. "Brass is trying to track them down now."

"Good. Let me know." Grissom checked his watch, already shuffling past his colleagues to the door. "I've got a meeting with the Sheriff to decide how to distribute our workload across the lab until we find her." He paused in the entrance, shaking his head slowly. "If we don't catch a break soon..."

The thought was left unfinished, but the message behind it was clear. Sara had been gone for four days. Time was running out.

Warrick turned to the strawberry-blonde, who had stepped towards the bench and now had her head clasped in her hands.

"You sure you don't want me to do this?" He offered, gesturing to the phonebook still sat open in front of her.

"No, it's okay." She straightened up and sniffed, subtly catching an escaped tear on her sleeve. "I need to do it."

**X x x**

Apparently the Sidle brothers – if that's indeed what they were – were not too dissimilar. She got the same automated voicemail message on Seth's phone as she had done on Dylan's.  
This time, however, she took the opportunity to leave a message. She left her name and number and a short, simple request that he call her back urgently, after which she trailed off.

How do you tell a complete stranger that their sister is missing, let alone by doing so in a voicemail message?

Putting the phone down on top of Sara's address book, she stared at it for a long moment; considering her next move.

Sara's neighbours hadn't seen or heard anything on that fateful morning. The car believed to have taken her away was a Honda Accord with blacked out windows and no licence plate – virtually untraceable. There was no apparent motive, barely any physical evidence from the scene and her family were not answering their phones.

Whoever had her, they certainly knew what they were doing.

"God Sara, where are you?" She asked of the vacant room, scanning the familiar surroundings through tear-glazed eyes. The lab felt different this week, like everyone was walking on eggshells. Even David Hodges, who normally would require a horse tranquillizer just to shut him up, had barely said two words to the team.

Shaking away the depressing thoughts, her gaze shifted to the computer and she quickly made a decision about where to go next. If the boys weren't answering their phones, perhaps there was another way to track them down.

Wiggling the mouse to wake up the screen, she signed in and opened every PD database she had access to. One way or another, she'd find something on these guys.

However, before she had the chance to type even one letter, a sharp knock drew her attention to the door.

"You tracked down Dylan and Seth Sidle yet?" Jim Brass asked, striding inside uninvited.

"Voicemail." She sighed, nodding at the folder in his hands. "You get something on her parents?"

"Oh, I got something alright." He agreed soberly, tossing it onto the table beside her. "And trust me, you'd get more straight answers out of Grissom's fetal pig then you will out of either of them."

X x x

**July 8****th****, 2004 - - Catherine Willows' House**

The porch light was out. She couldn't help but wonder, as she sloped wearily up the driveway, how long it had been that way.

They team hadn't been home in days. Upon finding his guys all dead on their feet and hovering around the coffee pot like flies, Grissom had come to the decision that they all needed a few hours to recover and regroup. Although, Catherine had sincere doubts that he would have taken his own advice.

She chucked her keys in the general direction of the table and sank onto the couch, her heavy eyes already starting to close beyond her control. It was only now, as she took the time to actually sit and breathe for a minute, that she felt the full force of her exhaustion. She could probably sleep for a full day, if only she could silence the voice of concern twittering incessantly in her head.

The sound of eager footsteps drew her eyes open again and she attempted a smile at her daughter.

"Hey, Lindsey." She greeted through a stifled a yawn.

"Are we going?" Lindsey asked, forgoing all courtesy. Cath was sure that she should know what the girl was referring to, but she didn't even have the energy to pretend right now. She pulled herself forward, attempting to look somewhat alert.

"Going where?"

"To the mall." Lindsey scowled. "You promised we could go at the weekend."

Catherine tipped her head back, taking a deep breath. Was it the weekend already? She couldn't remember. She vaguely recalled making such a declaration, but it felt like a lifetime ago.

"Oh, Lindsey honey." She sighed at last, reaching out a hand towards the eleven-year-old. "Maybe another day."

Lindsey scrunched her face up, wrenching her arm away in anger.

"Ugh, you're so unbelievable!" She wailed. "You promised!"

"Hey, I have a lot going on right now." Cath snapped with the last waning ounce of strength she possessed. "I would appreciate a little understanding right now."

Lindsey continued to scowl, but wisely kept her mouth shut until she made it to the bottom of the stairs – well out of Catherine's reach.

"All you ever think about it work! It's so unfair!" She snarled, stomping up the steps as loud as her tiny dancer's feet could carry her. Cath watched her go, both saddened and astonished by the tantrum. She'd barely been home two minutes and already she was being ambushed.

"She's feeling neglected." A calm voice pointed out unhelpfully, dragging a tired groan from the CSI.

"Not now mom, please." She begged, scrunching her eyes tight closed.

Lily moved around the couch, brushing an untidy stack of magazines to one side so she could perch on the coffee table.

"Any luck with Sara yet?" She asked sympathetically, studying her eldest child's features for some sign of hope.

"No." Catherine sighed, clawing her hands through her hair. "We don't even know where to begin finding her. I've been trying to contact her family, but that's ... that's looking like a dead end."

"Well, just don't forget about _your_ family. Lindsey's still your first priority, Catherine." The mother chastised. "I know you're stressed, but you have a responsibility to her."

Cath looked up, her jaw set in barely concealed irritation.

"What about my responsibility to Sara?" She challenged. "She's my family, too."

"Not really." Lily pulled a face. "I mean, I know you're close to your team. But she's not _your_ responsibility personally."

With surprising ease given her current energy levels, Catherine heaved herself up and threw her hands out defensively. However, the words she was trying to find just wouldn't come and she had to settle for a strangled whimper.

"Mom ... I can't deal with this right now." She offered instead. "I'm going for a shower, and then I'm going back to the lab."

"You can't keep doing this, Catherine." Lily hollered after her retreating form. "Even you need a break sometime."

However, her pleas went unheard and she was left to stare at the staircase despondently.

"Well," she sighed to the empty living room. "I'll make you something to eat then."

**X x x**

Catherine stepped out of the shower, her tender skin still stinging from the water, and wrapped herself into a fluffy gown.

Slipping back into the bedroom, she sank onto the bed and rolled her tense shoulders. She had hoped that a hot shower might help focus her mind and burn away the discomfort of that conversation with her mom, but it had failed on both counts.

Of course she felt bad for neglecting Lindsey, but Sara had to be her priority right now. Especially since today's developments would suggest that the brunette didn't have anyone else to call her family.

Beside her sat the folder Jim had provided earlier. She had only managed to skim read the details before Gil ordered them all to go home, but even that had been enough to give her an idea of what Sara's upbringing had been like.

Perhaps it was better on all counts if her parents weren't a part of their daughter's life anymore.

Knowing that she should leave it be for now and get some rest; and also knowing that that would never happen, she snatched up the report and turned to the first page.

Turns out she had been right about Dylan and Seth – they were Sara's brothers. And that was where the similarities with the siblings ended. Where Sara had become successful and independent, Dylan was a nomad 'of no fixed address' and Seth was an ex-juvie resident currently living in a trailer in Texas.

And little wonder, when you looked at the example set to them by their parents. Max Sidle was a violent alcoholic, murdered by Laura during a frenzied schizophrenic attack one dark night when Sara was still in elementary school.

Having been placed into care at the tender age of nine – two years younger than Catherine's own little girl was now – Sara was faced with a lifetime of looking after the mentally ill woman who had robbed her of a childhood.

Cath paused, her exhausted mind slowly starting to put the pieces together. Laura had been released from prison in 1996 after two lengthy appeals, on the grounds that she spends the rest of her life in residential care.

Care homes cost money. About $875 a week, at a guess.


	10. July 8th 2004

**Thanks for your patience guys, had a weekend away. **

* * *

**December 4****th****, 1982 - - Sidle's B&B, Tomales Bay, California **

All had gone very quiet.

She poked her head around the doorframe, peering into the dim hallway. Everything was still – unsettlingly so.

She tiptoed out of her bedroom and down the hall, holding her breath; lest the smallest sound should unleash all hell again.

At the entrance to her parent's bedroom, she paused. She could already smell it – coppery, metallic waves emanating from behind the slatted louvered door. The noise from this room not fifteen minutes ago had been deafening to the small girl – shrieks of terror and anger ricocheting throughout the rickety timber house.

Now, there was just silence.

She slid through the thin crack into the room. Her father was on the bed; naked, unmoving and sprawled inelegantly across the blood-soaked mattress. His arm was hanging off the edge, a trail of blood dripping rhythmically from the tip of his finger.

Sara's whole body began to tremble as her scared eyes scanned the faded walls splattered with angry red drops and the pool of dark liquid slowly spreading across the dirty wooden floor.

"Daddy?" She called out meekly, trying to peer at his face without breaching her save distance from the bed.

A stifled cry drew the child's attention to the floor. Her mother was curled against the dresser, sobbing hysterically into her hands. On the floor beside her lay a sharp and bloodstained knife.

Sara took a step towards her mom, when she was stopped by a firm hand on her shoulder. She looked up to find her big brother shaking his head at her.

"Dyl?" She questioned softly.

His only answer was to crouch down and scoop her up, carrying her out of the room.

The last thing she saw was her father's motionless, blue-tinted body lying in his own blood, before she was replaced on the cold floor in her own bedroom

"Dylan?" She cried out powerlessly, trying to follow him; but he shoved her forcefully backwards and slammed the door on his way out.

**X x x**

**July 8****th****, 2004 - - Nevada Desert**

Sara awoke with a start, the distant murmur of the nightmare still on her lips as she jolted upright; her instinctive attempts to pull away restricted by the heavy rusted chains slicing into her slender arms.

Before she could gather her bearings, a coarse hand had cupped her cheek firmly to still her sudden movements and she found herself blinking at a grizzled face hovering mere inches from her own. He was scowling, studying her features as if she were some exotic creature.

"Lei e sveglio." [_She's awake_] He announced, and for the first time she realised that this was a different man to the one she was used to.  
_He_ was still perched on his chair, also peering at her curiously through the cloud of smoke he seemed permanently encased in.

"Buona." [_Good_] He stated gruffly, sitting back and crossing one leg over the other.

The man crouched in front of her, satisfied that she was going to be okay, stood up and walked out.

She must have passed out again; her head felt thick and foggy and her attempts to shake it off only made the room spin even more.

Throwing her head back against the chipped wall, she sucked in several deep breaths of the suffocating thin air and tried to calm her already-shot nerves.

What time was it?

A quick glance at the cracks in the shoddy window-covering revealed a glimmer of sunlight. It was daytime. The stifling heat suggested around noon.

Not that that clarified much. She could have been unconscious for an hour or for a day; time was immaterial in this hell.

**X x x **

**July 8****th****, 2004 - - CSI, Hallway  
**

"Hey Cath!" An excitable voice hollered down the hall as she stepped out of Grissom's office.  
She had been wrong, the boss _had_ gone home. Although she'd bet anything that he wasn't sleeping.

Waiting for him to return was not an option given the time pressure on this case, so she had gone in search of someone else to help.  
And, apparently the only one of the team not to take Gil's advice, she had located Greg Sanders in one of the office; desperately searching the internet for anything that might be of use.

He wasn't really who she was looking for, but he would have to do. And oAndjudging by his sudden energy boost, that had not been an error in judgement.

"I got that information you wanted." He gushed, catching her up and falling easily into step with her. "The bank account Sara was paying that money into was a trust fund set up by a Margot Valentino."

"Okay." Catherine frowned, trying and failing to place the name. When it became apparent that the information meant very little to her, Greg offered a printout for clarification.

"She's Laura Sidle's mother."

Catherine took the piece of paper and studied the new details Greg had managed to unearth through heavy, narrowed eyes.

"Right. And Margot set up the fund in 1983 – the same year Laura was tried for Max's murder."

"I'm guessing she set it up to pay for the legal fees, and after the appeal came through she used the rest of money to pay for residential care." Greg hypothesised with a shrug.

"Do you have a number for Margot Valentino?" Cath asked, sidestepping the fact that the inexperienced CSI wannabe had probably just hit the target with that theory.

"No, she died in 2000. And all of her remaining assets after her death went into the fund."

"That must have been when Sara took over control of it."

"Yeah, but get this." He handed her a second document, detailing all the payments made into and out of the trust since the year 2000. "Margot's money dried up last year. Which is right around the time Sara started paying almost $900 into the account every week."

"So, grandma's money runs out and Sara's left to fund her mother's care herself." Catherine sighed sadly. "Explains why she was asking her brothers for help."

"And they slammed the phone down on her." Greg huffed. "They must owe her for thousands by now." He stopped in the middle of the corridor and turned face the blonde. "Did you have any idea about her mother?"

"No, not a clue." She choked out, clawing a hand over her face. "I wish she'd told me. Maybe we could have helped her, rather than her having to struggle on her own."

"Well, we can help her with it when we get her back."

Catherine smiled at the innocent hope in his voice, but it didn't quite reach her eyes.

"Yeah Greggy," she pursed her lips, laying a comforting hand on his arm and squeezing gently. "We will."

**X x x **

**July 8****th****, 2004 - - Nevada Desert**

"Come si fa a sapere il mio nonno era li?" _[How do you know my grandfather was there?]_

The question came out of the blue and her bodyguard raised an eyebrow at it, surprised by the sudden attempt at conversation from his captive. When he continued to stare at her, she assumed she must have gotten the words wrong and tried again.

"Nel corso della riunione prima della morte del padre – come si fa a sapere il mio nonno era li?" _[At the meeting before your father was killed – how do you know my grandfather was there?]_

"So." [_I know_] He assured her brusquely.

"E Nino?" [_And Nino?_] She added. "Perche ucciderlo se non conoscete chi ha ucciso tuo padre? E' stato un grosso rischio." _[Why kill him if you didn't know who killed your father? It was a big risk.]_

He choked out a bitter laugh, taking a long drag on his cigarette and sitting forward.

"Non volevo." _[I didn't want to.]_ He assured her. "Non abbiamo mai pianificato in questo modo." _[We never planned it that way]_  
Exhaling slowly, he breathed a cloud of smoke over her, but in her chained position she could only turn her head away from it. "Ma a volte in questo modo le carte cadono." _[But sometimes that's the way the cards fall]_

"Perche?" _[Why?] _She queried hoarsely, shifting her weight and wincing at the shot of pain that ran through her wrists. "Perche non si dice nulla?" _[Why didn't you say anything?]_

He emitted a dark chuckle and sat forwards, the smell of stale smoke and whiskey washing over her.

"Perche..." _[Because...]_ he answered cryptically, coughing out a sigh. "Perche non e come il gioco viene giocato." _[Because that's not how the game is played]_

Settled that that answered her question he snuffed out his cigarette on a singed patch of the wall, lit up another and sat back in his chair.

**X x x**

**July 8****th****, 2004 - - CSI, Layout Room  
**

"Damn." Warrick groaned. He didn't look any better off for the brief period of respite, but then neither did anyone else. "How come we never knew about this?"

"Sara's a private person." Cath shrugged helplessly. "I guess she thought it was none of our business."

"Yeah, well it is now." Nick asserted. "You know, if I was in this situation there's no way I'd let one of my sisters deal with it alone. These lowlifes have a lot to answer for."

"Well when we find them, you can tell them that in person." Grissom pointed out testily. If his sullen mood and drooping eyelids were anything to go by, his visit home hadn't been worth much either.

"What about this grandmother?" Warrick inquired, his green eyes scanning the new notes that had been added to the wall in his absence. "Where's the grandfather – Laura's father?"

"Greg's trying to work up a family tree." Cath explained nodding in the general direction of the computer labs. "He's been at it for about an hour, he might have found something by now."

"I'll go give him a hand." The dark-skinned CSI declared. "Maybe _granddad_ knows where these damn brothers are."

On his way out, he crossed paths with a poker-faced Jim Brass, who proffered only a blunt nod in greeting.

"I've got something you guys are going to want to see." He announced to the remaining CSIs. "When we did the door-to-door, a couple of Sara's neighbours weren't around. One of them," he cast a hurried glance at his notebook, "a Todd Jamison, got in a bar fight in Reno on Monday and has been in a jail cell all week. He got out on bail this morning and came home to find crime scene tape on his neighbour's door."

"Well if he was in Reno, what can he tell us?" Nick shrugged. "He can't have seen anything that happened."

"He didn't. But this might have." The detective held up a small videotape between his thumb and forefinger. "Apparently someone kept stealing his parcels, so he rigged up a spy camera to the peephole to try and catch the thief. When he heard what happened to Sara, he thought he'd _volunteer _it, in exchange for leniency when his own case comes to trial."

"I'll get this to Archie." Nick lunched forward and snatched the tape out of his hand, glad of some actual evidence at last.

"What about this Jamieson guy?" Gil pressed. "Did he have anything else to say?"

"Only that Sara was a quiet neighbour, kept to herself. He claims she let him use her parking spot while she was at work so his 'friends' could come round."

"What kind of parcels is he getting delivered that are so valuable, I wonder." Cath mused, catching his drift. Brass shrugged, indicating that he didn't really care enough to find out, and picked up a folder sitting on the bench.

"Any joy on the bank accounts?" He asked, flicking through the paperwork idly.

"We're starting to get somewhere." Catherine nodded. "I called the care home in California where Laura is and they confirmed that the only contact they've had with Laura's family was through Margot and Sara. Supports the idea that the boys aren't interested."

"Yeah, well that's my next move." Jim puffed his chest out, placing both hands flat on the bench. "I've got police in California and Texas trying to track them down right now. They might not give two cents about their mother, but they're damn well _going_ to care about their sister."

**X x x**

**July 8****th****, 2004 - - Nevada Desert**

"Il bagno?" _[Bathroom?]_

He heaved himself out of the chair and in one swift movement released her chains from the radiator. She shook the restraints off, glad of even the tiniest reprieve from the aching pain they caused.

However, before she could revel in the feeling, a firm hand had grabbed her arm and hoisted her up. Her legs were shaky from lack of movement and her head span as the blood rushed to her feet, but she was given little time to dwell on it as he frogmarched her across the creaky floorboards.

The corridor was dark, much like the rest of the property, but she had walked this path enough times since her arrival that she knew now to watch for the random step in the middle of the narrow hall.

She was pushed into a space barely bigger than a cupboard, where a solitary light bulb flickered ominously above her.

"Cinque minuti." _[Five minutes.]_ He declared gruffly, slamming the door shut.

She stared around herself for a few seconds, letting her eyes adjust.

She had debated kicking the bathroom window in and making a break for it, but quickly discarded the notion. It was so filthy; she couldn't see what was out there. For all she knew, she could jump out and land straight on an armed guard.  
And as much as she hated this torturous punishment, she realised that it was in her best interests not to piss these people off too much.

At least they were allowing her some small human rights, even if it was only water and bathroom breaks. They obviously wanted to keep her alive for something.

She manoeuvred herself around the tiny room to turn sideways, attempting to examine her head injury in the stained and cracked mirror. It was bruised and clotted with blood. Her earlier efforts to clean it had resulted in nothing more than a lot of pain and profuse bleeding, so she elected to leave it be for now and pray that it wouldn't get infected.

She just had to hope that her team would find her in time - before her captors' necessity for her life expired.


	11. July 9th 2004

**I have a relative in hospital and it all got a bit hairy this week, so you'll have to forgive me for the delay in getting this up. I hope it was worth the wait :)**

* * *

**July 9****th****, 2004 - - CSI, AV Lab**

"This guy was no Francis Ford Coppola." Archie bemoaned. His attempts to improve the focus of the blurry video had yielded little result and they were left with the hellish task of identifying each indistinct figure that had sloped past Mr Jamison's door on the fateful morning of July 4th.

"Yeah, well this might be our only way to identify who has her; so do your best." Nick practically pleaded, propping his heavy head up on the back of his companion's chair. It was true, unless something else came along to break the case, this video could be their only hope.

Resigning himself to the fact that it was as clear as it was going to get, Archie tapped a few keys and hit play. Brass had only provided the tape from the day Sara went missing, so now it was just a case of narrowing down the time frame and locating their friend.

"I talked to some of her neighbours that day, so we should be able rule them out." Nick glanced down at his notes, trying pitifully to recall the faces of all the people he had spoken to. He had been so stressed out; he'd barely registered anything beyond his own internal panic.

As the tape whirred on in mute, their skilled eyes twitched with each movement.  
Clearly, some of Sara's neighbours were living on the opposite side of the law to her. There was the guy indolently smoking a joint in broad daylight, the couple having a public domestic at the crack of dawn. And not forgetting the young arsonist setting fire to the wheelie bins in the lot across the street.

No wonder Sara never went home. It must be like living in a low security rehab centre.

Archie bit back a chuckle as two teenagers scuttled into view, glancing around anxiously, before one of them stooped down and snatched up a package from Todd Jamison's doorstep.

"Well, there's his thief." He noted with a hint of amusement. "Or thieves. I wonder why he doesn't just get a PO box or something for his 'deliveries'."

"Wait, pause it on that guy." Nick barked, ignoring the tech's rambling and peering closer at the screen. "Is that a shotgun?"

The guy who strode into view was tall, sharp-suited with dark hair and a beard to match. There was something long and unsettlingly recognisable slung over his left shoulder and he was walking calmly and purposefully in the direction of Sara's flat.

"Yeah, looks like it." Archie noted the time down on his documentation and carried on.

"There." Nick slapped him on the shoulder after a few minutes and Archie paused it a second time.

It was fuzzy, but frozen on the screen was a dark haired woman in jeans and a knee-length black coat, wrapped tightly around her despite the glaring sun she was walking into.

"That's her." He smacked his mate again, oblivious to the bruises he could be causing. "That's her, that's Sara."

For a moment the two of them just stared at the grainy image with a heavy heart. Though it was hard to be sure, she appeared relaxed; certainly in no hurry. Wherever her attacker was, he was still out of sight at this point.

With a sad sigh, Archie continued the tape. Less than two minutes later, he hit pause for a final time.

"Damn." Nick ground out from between his clenched teeth.

In spite of the terrible resolution, they could clearly make out the man with the shotgun. He was heading the opposite way, back towards the stairs, but this time he wasn't alone. Cradled in his arms, seemingly unconscious, was the same dark-haired woman bearing a striking resemblance to their missing colleague.

"Damn!" The Texan repeated, slamming his fist onto the table in fury.

Drawn by the commotion, Gil Grissom materialised in the doorway.

"You find something?" He asked hopefully, his gaze already seeking out the image on the screen. His face fell in despair at the sight.

"Yeah, we found her." Nick breathed. "One guy, with a gun."

"None of her neighbours reported hearing a gun shot." Grissom pointed out, trying to ignore the fluttering of butterflies in his stomach at the picture of Sara's limp body being stolen away. "So, used for complacency?"

"Or he hit her with it." Archie theorised. "She looks out of it and you guys did find blood in the doorway, right?"

"Arch, clear his face up as much as you can and get it to Brass." Grissom ordered, bypassing the comment completely. "The sooner we identify _him_, the faster we find _her_."

"Yes sir." The young man obliged, taking as many screenshots of the man with the gun as he could and lining them up side-by-side to pick the clearest.

"Nick." Grissom swung his attention to the Texan, an instruction waiting on the tip of his tongue; but Nick already had his cell phone out and was in the middle of dialling.

"Yeah, I'll get the description out to dispatch." He guessed. "If he's still in Vegas, we'll find him."

**X x x**

**July 9****th****, 2004 - - CSI, Layout Room**

"You will never guess who Sara's grandfather is." Warrick gushed, tossing a printed black and white photograph onto the table. "Angelo Valentino."

"Is that supposed to mean something to me?" Catherine frowned, picking up the image and squinting at it. It showed a tall, slender man in a jet-black suit, a fedora hat prominently sat atop a mass of shoulder-length brunette waves and a cigarette hanging between his pouting lips.

Warrick scoffed in surprise at her ignorance and turned to Greg. The young lab rat was practically bouncing off the walls at this new discovery.

"Angelo Valentino is a Made Man from New York." He explained, producing a book on Vegas history and planting it on the table as if it held all the answers to their mystery. "He disappeared from the scene about thirty years ago, right around the time of the mafia commission trials that sent a lot of the mafia underground."

"Okay." Catherine nodded, catching Gil's eye in joint confusion. "How does this help us find Sara?"

Warrick stepped up again, calmer this time, and locked eyes with the woman.

"You remember I said that Nino Carmine was suspected of killing Joseph Acerbi on New Year's Eve, 1958?" He pursed his lips, tapping the photo lying between them. "Another key suspect in the murder was Angelo Valentino. And, Nino left the limelight right around the same time that Angelo did."

There was a moment of silence as the significance of this sank in.

"So, Nino Carmine and Angelo Valentino were both suspected of killing a mafia boss in 1958." Cath frowned, trying to organise the rush of jumbled thoughts flooding her brain. "And forty six years later, Nino winds up murdered and Angelo's granddaughter is kidnapped all in the same week."

"Well, that can't be a coincidence." Gil noted. He had not been working Nino Carmine's death, and due to Sara's disappearance he hadn't had chance to catch up on Warrick's notes yet. "Did you have a suspect in mind for Nino's murder?"

"No, it was looking like a dead end case." Warrick shrugged. Until now, he hadn't given the dead mobster lying in the morgue a second thought. "I'll go back over the evidence and see if we missed anything."

"Well before you do, take a look at this." Greg jumped in, returning their attention to the book he had brought and swinging it open to a specific page. In the centre was a large photo of Tony Accardo – the man who had taken over from Al Capone after the latter's capture and imprisonment for tax evasion.  
"Back in the late fifties, when things were getting a bit too hot for some of the gangsters in Vegas, there was a plot to take out Accardo and usurp control of the Chicago Outfit. Joey Acerbi was the main orchestrator and he was believed to have met with three other gangsters to plot the assassination. Angelo Valentino and Nino Carmine were the hot suspects." He lifted a finger to his temple and mimed pulling a trigger. "A few months later, Joey gets a cap in the head in Times Square."

"Who was the third man at the meeting?" Grissom urged, beginning to lose patience with Greg's excitable babbling.

"Nobody knows for sure." He shrugged. "But according to the rumours at the time, Joey had a lot of friends in Vegas; including ..." he trailed off, shooting Catherine a lingering look.

**X x x**

**July 9****th****, 2004 - - Catherine Willows' House**

"Why didn't you marry Sam?"

Lily jumped, taken aback by the question, or the harshness with which it was delivered.

"Catherine?" She asked, putting down her cup of tea and rising instantly from the chair. Catherine looked almost shell-shocked, her deathly white complexion only enhanced by the darkness behind her as she stood framed in the kitchen doorway. Lily moved towards her, her arms outstretched in concern; but Cath stepped away from her, slinking back into the shadows of the lounge.

"Was it because he was married – or because you knew he was a murderer?" She continued.

"Catherine?" Lily came to an abrupt stop in the middle of the room, stunned into immobility. "What are you talking about? What's wrong?"

"New Year's Eve, 1958. Joseph Acerbi." Catherine enunciated slowly, pressing her pale lips into a tight line. "Did Sam kill him?"

"No!" Lily gasped. "Why on earth would you ask me that?"

"Because somebody did." She spat. "And that's why Sara's missing, because someone's taking revenge for his death."

"Sam wouldn't do that, Catherine." Lily promised, her tight red perm trembling as she shook her head in bewilderment. "He's not a murderer."

"Yes, he is." The younger woman countered with a painful bluntness that caused her mother to flinch. "He killed Vivian Verona and he might have killed Joseph Acerbi. And if he did, then it's not just Sara who's in danger."

"He's your father." Lily stepped up to her, a desperately earnest look in her powder-blue eyes. "And believe it or not Catherine, he does care about you. He would never let anything happen to you."

The disparaging scoff she got in response said it all.

"Catherine, what's going on?" Lily begged, reaching out a hand to grip her wrist. "Have you found something about Sara?"

"Yes, we have." The CSI snarled, pulling away violently and heading back to the front door. "And Sam's up to his neck in it!"

Lily's attempts to call her back fell into the gaping space between them and she was left alone to watch in dismay as her eldest child vanished as hastily as she had arrived.  
Slowly, Lily lowered herself back into her seat at the kitchen table and stared morosely into the milky liquid swirling in her mug.

She knew that Sam was no angel, she wasn't completely naive. But she also knew that he wasn't a monster – if he held information about a missing woman, a friend of Catherine's no less – he wouldn't keep it to himself. After all, he was a father too.

Sometimes, she wished that Catherine could remember the first time she had met Sam. If she saw him then, fussing over his little daughter with the excitement and affection befitting any first-time dad, she would see what Lily saw in him.

Surely, that man, that doting father, could not have killed with the same hands he used to cradle that innocent baby so tenderly.

**X x x**

**March 26****th****, 1959 - - Sunrise Hospital Maternity Ward**

Sam pushed the door open and crept inside, the over-sized bouquet clutched in his hands brushing against the frame as he slid through the gap. The room, like every other on this ward, was small and compact with the bare essentials required for a new mother. Everything was white and gleaming, except for the beautiful woman laid centre stage in the railed bed.

Lily was asleep, her head turned towards him and her flame-red hair splayed across the pillow in an elegant arc. Shuffling his leather shoes across the tiled floor, he placed the flowers gently on the bedside table and leant down to drop a kiss onto her rose-tinted cheek.

It was only when he straightened up that he saw it; on the other side of the bed, angled away from him.

He had stood for an age in front of the window, admiring the many tiny babies in their cots with their little numbered bracelets; studying each one intently for something recognisable to try and discern which one was his. But, evidently, it had been an effort in futility.

Tiptoeing around the base of the bed, he leant over the bassinet and a large smile graced his features as the baby's eyes blinked open. Blue, just like his own.

He stooped down and picked her up, trailing the soft cream blanket along too. She felt firm and heavy in his hands, more so than he had expected. But she looked delicate, with a tiny upturned nose, a pouting pink mouth and narrowed searching eyes. Already, she seemed to be scrutinising him.  
Tiny fingers reached out towards his face and he let them brush his lips, placing a kiss into her palm.

"Hello, my little girl." He cooed, drawing a squeak from the baby.

Moving back to the bed, he perched carefully on the edge – mindful not to disturb Lily – and cradled the child in his arms.

"One day, you're going to rule this town." He told her proudly, letting his wide hand brush the tufts of red hair already adorning her head. "You're going to call all the shots. And don't worry about anyone giving you grief, because if they do you just send them my way." He promised her with a determined frown. "I won't let anyone lay a finger on you."

Hoisting her up, he supported her heavy head with one hand and pressed a kiss to her cheek.

"My little girl. My daughter." He breathed, inhaling the sweet scent that is distinctly purity and newness.

"Catherine." Sam turned to the pillows, where Lily remained the picture of peaceful slumber as she spoke, her voice vacant and thick with sleep. "Her name's Catherine."


	12. July 9th - July 10th 2004

**July 9****th****, 2004 - - Tangiers Casino**

Sam's henchmen came to a sudden halt, realising that their charge was no longer with them.

Sam had stopped in the middle of the hall and was watching in silent surprise as a recognizable figure barrelled her way through the jovial crowd towards him; waves of anger rolling off her like John Carpenter's Fog.

She caught sight of him staring and quickened her pace, practically throwing people out of her path with a single glare.

"You knew!" She snarled, not coming to a stop until she was barely an inch away from him; where she began beating her fists against his chest in a frantic fit of rage. "You knew that she was missing; you knew that and you still didn't say anything!"

Sam's aides watched on in shock as their boss stood there and took the violent abuse from this diminutive woman without so much as flinching. Even though he massively overshadowed her, the punches still had to hurt; but he showed no sign of it in his stoic features.

Eventually, when the spirited attack become too much to sustain, he gripped her balled hands firmly against his chest and waited for her to meet his eye through the river of tears streaking down her flushed cheeks.

"Come inside." He gestured towards his office. "I can explain."

* * *

"You're being blackmailed?" She had refused the offer to sit down, electing instead to pace her way around the large office. "By who?"

"I don't know." He insisted. "All I know is they want $250,000 by the end of next week or I'm going to find myself joining Nino in your coroner's freezer."

He managed to sound oddly unperturbed about that threat, but deep down his stomach had been turning somersaults for days. Not that Catherine cared right now.  
She scoffed, muttering something under her breath that he decided he'd rather not hear anyway.

"Catherine, I swear I don't know anything about your missing friend." He promised, following her anxious movements with sympathetic eyes. "If I did, I would tell you."

"Where do they want the money dropping off?"

"They haven't said yet. I had an anonymous note left for me at reception." He produced a neatly folded piece of paper from his top pocket and offered it to her. "I'm expecting another anytime."

Snatching a tissue from the box on his desk, she accepted the note between her thumb and forefinger and delicately peeled it open. True to his word, there was just a demand for the money with further instructions to follow. Careful not to damage any potential fingerprints, she wrapped the note inside the tissue and pocketed it.

"When you get the second one, I want to know." She demanded. "Whoever is after you, they have Sara too. So, you'd better think long and hard about who might want you dead; because if anything happens to her, I'm going to blame you!"

Spinning on her heel, she made to leave; her tangled golden waves bouncing with every angry stride she took across the spacious room. Sam stood up too, watching her stalk away from him.

"It's a dirty world we live in Muggs," he called out to her, though the plea fell on deaf ears. "You can't hold me responsible for everything that happens in it."

* * *

**July 9****th****, 2004 - - CSI, Layout Room**

"I don't get it." Nick moped. "I mean, why take Sara? Why not one of the boys, or Laura even?"

"Sara was the easy target." Warrick pointed out. "Laura's in a secure hospital and look how hard it's been for us to track down the boys. Sara lives alone, she works unsociable hours. They could get in, grab her and get out without ever being seen."

"Yeah, but they had to know that taking a CSI was going to bring them a lot of heat." The Texan continued, his bewilderment at the situation evident in his increasingly high-pitched voice. "Surely it would be easier to just kill Angelo Valentino."

"If they can find him." Warrick added.

"Hey, guys." Greg interrupted their little têtê-à-têtê, spinning around on his computer chair to face them. "Is it just me, or are we looking at this all wrong?"

"What do you mean?" Warrick asked, abandoning Nicky at the centre bench and loping towards the young tech.

"Well, if whoever has Sara took her in revenge for Joey Acerbi's murder, surely we should be looking at _his_ family, not hers."

There was a long moment as Warrick and Nick shared a lingering look across the room. Despite all their combined wealth of knowledge, leave it to the naive newbie to make the jump of logic.

"Yeah. Yeah, good call." Nick cleared his throat, drumming his fingertips on the edge of the table. "I'll start to work up a family tree."

"I'll check my book." Greg added, glad that his suggestion hadn't been disregarded offhand. "I'm sure it said something about Acerbi having a son – if we can track him down..."

The comment was cut off by the untimely arrival of a solemn Jim Brass.

"Whatever you're about to do, it can wait." He declared gravely. "Police in California picked up Dylan Sidle. He's on his way here."

* * *

**July 10****th****, 2004 - - Las Vegas Police Department**

The doors were pushed open and a middle-aged man donning a scruffy beard and black eye was frogmarched roughly down the wide corridor, flanked by four uniformed officers. The team watched on in silence, taking in his appearance. He was wearing tattered jeans, a long-sleeved shirt hanging open over a black Guns-'n'-Roses t-shirt and heavy work boots that he dragged wearily across the floor.

With his dirty-blonde hair and cobalt blue eyes, he looked nothing like Sara.

He caught them staring and returned the gesture, holding each gaze in turn for as long as he could before Officer Mitchell thrust him into the nearest interrogation room with a ruthless shove.

The team exchanged a look that fell somewhere between relief and apprehension, nobody wanting to be the first to speak. The boys took a step closer in order to get a better look at their friend's elusive sibling while he was being forcefully situated at the table.

"Are you sure you want to do this?" Gil asked, placing a hand on Catherine's arm.

"Yeah." She exhaled, stuffing her hands into the pockets of her long coat in an attempt to disguise the caffeine-induced tremors she was suffering from. "There are a few things I'd like to say to him, actually."

"Rip him a new one for me." Warrick patted her on the shoulder, as the group filed into the observation room, leaving Catherine and Brass alone in the hallway.

"Are you ready for this?" The detective asked. He had known this woman long enough to realise that it was futile trying to change her mind, but he also knew it could get messy in there and Cath was not in the most stable emotional state right now.

"I want to speak to him." She reiterated. "I need to know why."

He scrutinised her, watching for any sign of hesitation or deliberation. Finding none, he released the breath he had been holding and pushed the door open for her to enter.

"Okay. Let's go find out why."

* * *

**July 10****th****, 2004 - - Las Vegas Police Department, Interrogation Room C**

"So, what does Las Vegas police want from me?" The man sniffed, casting nervy glances around the sparse hole he had been so unceremoniously thrown in to.

"You're a tricky man to track down, Dylan." Brass noted, ignoring the question as he took his seat at the table beside the CSI. "I guess that's why Sara resorted to leaving voicemails for you, huh?"

Dylan huffed out a bitter laugh, wiping a scarred hand across his mouth.

"That's why I'm here? Because my sister got pissed off with me ducking her calls? I don't fucking believe it." He started to stand up, but Brass' stern voice stopped him in his tracks.

"You're here, because your sister is missing."

Dylan froze, sliding slowly back into his seat.

"She's missing? Where is she?"

"Well if we knew that, she wouldn't be missing." Brass spat, catching sight of Catherine rolling her eyes in frustration.

"Sara was calling you about funding your mother's care." She interjected. "Why didn't you try to help her?"

"She never asked me for help." He shrugged, drawing a sharp scoff from the criminalist.

"Now, I know that's not true." She leant forward, levelling him a dark glower. "She left you a message asking for help and your response was to 'get a loan'. Right?"

"Yeah, I returned her call and told her that she was going to cause trouble if she wasn't careful." He agreed, mildly puzzled by the line of questioning.

"Oh you returned her call alright, but it wasn't her that answered." Catherine informed him. "That was me you slammed the phone down on."

"Oh." Dylan scowled, giving her a once over, as if only actually noticing her for the first time. "Well, if I'd known that I would have asked for your number first."

His sassy comment earned him a sharp smack on the back of the head from Officer Mitchell and he bit back a yelp of surprise. Brass raised his hand at the officer, a silent warning.

"We know about your grandfather, Angelo Valentino." He explained, changing tack. "We know that someone's out to get him, and they're using Sara to do it. So, where is _he_?"

"I don't know." Dylan sulked, sniffling and wiping at his nose. The slap must have hurt, as his eyes had started to water. "I haven't seen him in years."

"Wrong answer."

"You knew that something was going to happen, that's why you warned Sara not to ask for money again. So, what do you know about your grandfather's 'business'?" Catherine pressed.

"I don't know anything about it." Dylan repeated adamantly, barely resisting the temptation to lurch across the table at them. "The last time I saw him, I was a kid and he was walking out on our family. I haven't had anything to do with him since."

"No? Well let me catch you up to speed." Brass played along sarcastically. "_Someone_ seems to think he killed Joseph Acerbi in 1958, and that _someone_ has your sister as a hostage until your grandfather comes out of hiding. So, I repeat, where is he?"

Dylan's gaze had settled on the one-way mirror behind them and he flashed it a grimacing smile. Sitting forwards, he rested his elbows on the table and chuckled to himself in amusement.

"Boy, you guys are way off." He snarked. "I don't know what kind of dodgy shit grandpa was into; but I can tell you that if someone's after Sara, it's nothing to do with some dude who died in 1958."

They raised their eyebrows expectantly, awaiting elaboration. The man licked his lips and leant in as close as the restrictive table would allow, lowering his voice to an almost sultry tone.

"You want to find my sister; you ought to take a long, hard look at our parents."


	13. November 26th 1969

**Hope you guys are enjoying it so far, would be lovely to see some new names in my reviews :P **

* * *

**November 26****th****, 1969 - - Tomales Bay, California**

Angelo stepped out of the car, a cloud of dust rising around his Italian black leather shoes before settling again with an almost-exasperated wheeze. He lifted his gaze slowly from the sandy ground to stare up at the shabby buildings with distaste.

The row of motel rooms stretching out to his left was battered and wind-beaten, wooden frames rotting away from the foundations and a low roof sagging beneath the weight of overhanging bishop pine tree branches.  
The large area of grassland extending out beyond them was dead and brown, the shrubbery bare; their lost leaves littering the path he was currently treading.

To his right, inexplicably abandoned in overgrown grassland, sat a dilapidated old fishing boat with the name Black Pearl daubed in dark blue paint on the once-white wood.

Directly in front of him, at the entrance to the square of dirt masquerading as a parking lot, lay the house. Surrounded by a staggered wall and sitting atop a flight of stone steps, it was a single-story pine-wood dwelling with blue hand-painted trim and rapidly disintegrating window frames. Like the motel rooms, it needed a lot of work.

He turned his back on the property to scan the view, squinting against the low afternoon sun hanging barely above the horizon. The motel, situated in an obscure little part of Tomales Bay known locally as Nick's Cove, sat directly opposite a stretch of bronze-coloured beach.  
Other than the seafood restaurant – also, very originally, named Nick's Cove – and the long pier reaching out into the sea, there was nothing much to write home about. Halfway down the pier was an iconic wooden archway, a fake fish suspended from its centre, signifying the primary source of income in this dreary little town.

The road forked just ahead of where he was stood, with one part continuing up the Shoreline Highway that he had just travelled along and the other sloping down to a dead-end series of parking spaces directly on the seafront.

On this cold, wintery afternoon, the waves were lashing against the rocks and spilling onto the sand-coated concrete. There was no-one around, but for a couple of stoic fishermen braving the weather and an older man in a dirty apron sweeping up outside the aforementioned restaurant a few yards down the road.

With an almost reluctant sigh, Angelo dragged his attention away from the empty view and hauled his aching feet up the cracked steps to the house. The wooden planks composing the patio were soft and unstable beneath his feet and he felt that if he knocked too hard he could punch a hole straight through the front door.

Oddly enough, he couldn't help but feel that this was a bad idea.

* * *

In his hurry to answer the incessant rapping, Max nearly tripped over one of the many stray boxes still littering the lounge floor.

Though when he finally made it to the front door and realised who his impatient visitor was, he began to regret responding at all; for it was not someone he expected nor had any particular desire to see.

"Max." The stern voice greeted him with the kind of icy chill that instantly set his teeth on edge.

"Angelo." Max nodded tersely, stepping aside. He had long since learned that it was a fruitless endeavour attempting to prevent access to this man, for he would wait all day if he had to. At least this time he'd had the courtesy to knock.

"Nonno!" An excited young voice squealed and Dylan appeared in a flash of red and gold, hurling himself at the old man. Angelo was a towering figure to most, but Dylan held no fear around him.

"Hey, there he is!" Angelo hoisted the boy onto his hip and examined him. He had grown so much. With Max's blonde hair and bright blue eyes, Dylan's features were so different from those of Angelo's – he could scarcely believe this child was his own flesh and blood.

Another voice could be heard emanating from the little kitchen at the end of the house – gentle, floaty singing; and it was a voice Angelo recognised instantly as his daughter's. He set Dylan back on the floor and leant down to his level.

"Hey, why don't you go draw Nonno a picture of your new house?" He suggested, smiling affectionately as the little boy scampered off to oblige.

"He's a good boy." He stated, straightening up and meeting Max's steely gaze. "He deserves more than this."

"He's happy with _this_." Max countered bitterly. "Some children don't rely on material gifts to be content."

Rolling his eyes, Angelo brushed off his son-in-law's hippie mentality and made to follow the sound of Laura's song. However, he quickly found his path blocked.

"She's feeding our son." Max explained firmly, folding his arms across his chest in a blatant act of defiance. His shoulder-length dirty-blonde hair fell in untamed waves across his bare shoulders, his sweat-stained tank top splattered with powder-blue paint drops; and despite his peace-loving lifestyle, he cut a robust figure.

"Mi nipote. My grandson." Angelo corrected. "I have a right to see him."

"Yes, you do." The younger man acknowledged, though it obviously pained him to do so. "When she's ready."

Coincidentally, as the words left his lips, Laura materialised in the entrance-cum-lounge with the baby in her arms. She placed Seth carefully into his bassinet and hurriedly cleared the room to greet her father.

"Papa." She frowned, her arms outstretched towards him. "What are you doing here?"

He accepted her into a brief embrace, pressing a kiss to her temple; choosing to ignore the streak of plasterdust adorning her left cheek.

"Well, when your mother said that you'd bought a motel in California, I didn't believe her." He explained, sidling around the adults to peer into the crib. "But apparently it's true."

"We're going to run it as a business." Max interjected, moving swiftly to his wife's side and slipping a protective arm around her waist. "You keep asking how I'm going to support my family. This is it."

"Aye." Angelo agreed, casting an uncertain glance around the bare, undecorated room. Even from here, he could see into almost every room in the diminutive house. "This is it."

"It needs some work." Laura admitted. "But that's okay; we don't mind putting some time and effort into it, do we honey?"

"Of course not." Max agreed, watching on warily as Angelo bent down and extracted Seth from his bed. "It'll all be worth it once we get going."

"And you really think you can support a wife, two sons, on this?" Angelo pushed, bouncing the baby gently in his large hands. Seth grizzled at the interruption to his afternoon nap, balling tiny fists into his scrunched eyes. Angelo smiled, studying the little features. At barely two weeks old, he could already tell that this child, like his big brother, had acquired the fair looks of their father.

"We can make it work." Max snapped adamantly, beginning to lose patience.

"Who's going to stay here?" Angelo continued, his thick accent becoming more pronounced with each increase in pitch. He gestured outside towards the deathly quiet road. "I've been driving for miles and this is the first house I've seen."

"It's a tourist destination, papa." Laura pointed out earnestly, determined not to give in to his pessimistic outlook. "People come here on vacation."

"Vacation?" He repeated, as if this were a foreign term to him. "You've got twelve rooms out there; you really think twelve families are going to come to a little hole in the middle of nowhere in November?"

Without flinching, Max deadpanned his response.

"We'll take in gypsies in the winter."

* * *

Max checked once more on his wife and children in the next room, before closing the kitchen door and turning to his increasingly impudent father-in-law. Angelo was examining the faucet, seemingly bemused by the fact that nothing happened when you turned it on.

"We haven't got the water set up yet." He explained brusquely, dragging the elder's attention back.

"I see." Angelo coughed. "And, how do you purport to take care of your family with no running water?"

"It's going to be sorted in the next couple of days. And if we get stuck, there's always the sea." It was meant as a joke, but Angelo's raised eyebrow suggested he did not see the funny side.

Granted, the little house was compact. And with no heat or water, it had been an uncomfortable first week; but Max had grand plans for it. This was his home – their home. And he was going to make it work if it took him a lifetime to do so.

Angelo had evidently tired of the conversation and was peering out of the dirty windows, staring bleakly onto the barren wasteland behind the property.

"I think Laura and the boys should come back with me." He asserted, never one to mince his words. "At least until you get the essentials running."

"No." Max ground out between his teeth. Though he had aspired to have as little contact as possible with his in-laws, he was well aware of how the Valentino family worked. If he allowed Laura to leave with this man now, he'd never entice her back again. "This is our home now, Angelo." He spat brazenly. "And we're not leaving it."

There was a long moment where neither spoke, their eyes locked in a frosty staring contest across the small room.

Finally, in slow measured steps, Angelo strode towards him and held his forearm with the kind of grip one would only expect from a vice machine.

"You'd better make this work." He hissed. "Because if you ever let my family down, I'll let you down. Potete contrare su di essa."


	14. July 10th 2004

**In case you're wondering how Sara's doing ...**

* * *

**July 10th, 2004 - - Nevada Desert**

Today, Sara awoke to a startling development; for today was the first time since her ordeal began that she had woken up alone in this little ramshackle prison cell. Her stoic and chain-smoking security guard – normally watching over her morning, noon and night with an impenetrable silence – was nowhere to be seen.

She doubted very much that her captors had suddenly acquired a newfound trust in her, so something else must be going on to drag him away.

As her weakened senses adjusted to the unstimulating environment, she became vaguely aware of raised voices traversing down the narrow hallway from the perpetually darkened room at the end.

"E dov'è?!" [Where is he?!] A familiar tone demanded.

"Non lo so." [I don't know.] Another confessed; and even she picked up on the hint of panic in his voice. "Sono domande." [They're asking questions.]

"Naturalmente sono. Il loro lavoro a pore domande." [Of course they are. It's their job to ask questions.] The boss spat dismissively.

"Si, ma..."[Yes, but...] The anxious man stuttered. "Ma che cosa se la polizia lo trovo prima?" [But what if the police find him first?]

For a moment she thought they must have stopped talking, as everything fell quiet. She strained closer, but the pain in her head had been growing exponentially day-on-day; inducing agony with even the smallest of movements.

She managed, however, to catch the low murmur of human voices and realised that they were still exchanging words, just at a volume indistinguishable to her ears. Nevertheless, there was one phrase that she heard clear as day.

"Allora avremo a liberarsi della sua." [Then we'll have to get rid of her.]

* * *

**July 10th, 2004 - Las Vegas Police Department, Observation Room**

Jim closed the door and turned to the awaiting group.

"So, what do you think?"

"He's not the most sympathetic of people." Catherine mused, one eye still watching their sullen suspect through the glass. "But I don't think he'd purposefully mislead us."

"So, maybe he genuinely doesn't know anything about his grandfather." Grissom suggested. "You said Valentino disappeared in the 80s, right? Dylan would only have been a teenager then."

"I don't know; I still don't trust him." Nick scowled, moving in front of the door to glower at the middle-aged man. Dylan was shuffling his feet anxiously, his twitchy gaze seeking out every corner of the compact interrogation room as if following the movements of something that nobody else could see. "I mean, look at him. I can smell the fumes from here."

"I guess it can't hurt to take another look at the parents." Catherine sighed, turning her back to the one-way mirror and leaning heavily against it. "Although I don't know what we're going to find out from a dead man and a schizophrenic murderer."

"Well, he's refusing to say anything else until his lawyer gets here." Brass shrugged. "But he took a swing at the officer who brought him off the plane – that should be enough to hold him for now."

"Good." Grissom nodded absently, checking his watch. It was a nervous habit he had acquired of late, as if he was counting down the minutes until Sara was found. "Maybe some thinking time will clear his memory."

"Well, we were going to look into Acerbi's family and see if anyone might still be holding a grudge about his death." Warrick finally spoke up and Gil's interest peaked at the suggestion.

"Good, I'll come with you." He agreed hurriedly. "If anyone catches a break, use the emergency pager code to get in touch."

He turned to the detective and raised an eyebrow, but Jim had already guessed what he was going to say and held up his hands in assurance.

"Yeah, I'll keep Sidle Junior company." He promised. "Maybe when the withdrawal symptoms wear off he'll become a bit more talkative."

* * *

**July 10th, 2004 - - CSI, Layout Room**

"Greg was right, there is a son." Nick explained. "A Raymond Acerbi, born in September 1959 – nine months after Joseph died. I bet Joey didn't even know he was going to be a dad."

Grissom's expression said that he really didn't care about the unjust timing of Joseph's death, more concerned with the relevance of this information as it pertained to finding Sara.

"1959." He repeated, calculating the numbers in his head. "That would make him forty-four. So, he can't have been the man in the security video."

"No, bosses rarely put themselves on the line. He'll have sent a soldier to do his dirty work." Warrick corrected. "Just like with Nino's murder."

"Hmm." Gil nodded slowly, continually marvelled by his protégé's wealth of knowledge about mafia dealings. "How did you get on with Nino's case? Any new leads?"

"No, I went over everything with a fine-toothed comb. Whoever killed him was careful."

"But not careful enough." The trio were interrupted by the always welcome sound of Doc Robbins' cane clicking into the room. "I finished the autopsy on Nino Carmine, as a priority." He offered the notes to Warrick, who flicked through them with rarely seen impatience as he scoured the reams of text for any small detail of significance.

"Cause of death?" Grissom asked, watching Warrick's features for that distinctive sign that he had hit on something of interest.

"Fairly obvious: multiple gunshots to the face." The coroner shrugged. "I found some fibres in what was left of his nose, sent them to trace. But the interesting thing was his hands, take a look." He produced a set of x-rays and slid them across the table one at a time.

"His palms are broken." Nick noted, holding the ghostly images up to the light. "Shattered, in fact."

"He was hammered." Warrick realised aloud. Usually used as a warning after stealing from a casino, hammering was also occasionally employed by the mafia for the purposes of extracting information.

"Yeah, and I found the same thing on his feet and his kneecaps." Albert continued sombrely. "He was tortured before he was murdered."

A deathly silence fell over the team as the depth of this sank in. If the same person who'd killed Nino was currently holding Sara, that didn't bode too well for her right now.

"Okay." Nick cleared his throat, shaking away the worst-case-scenario thoughts that were suddenly flooding his mind. "So, where's Raymond Acerbi now?"

"His address is listed as New York, but he also has links to Las Vegas through some of the smaller casinos off strip that used to belong to Joseph Acerbi." Warrick answered. "I guess daddy wanted to keep his business in the family."

"Yeah, well too bad for him he messed with the wrong family this time." The Texan snapped. "What do you wanna bet that Raymond is in Las Vegas right now?"

"If he is then we'll find him." Grissom stated in an eerily calm voice, his gaze still fixed on the haunting images of Nino's battered and slaughtered body.

* * *

**July 10th, 2004 - - Las Vegas Police Department, Interrogation Room C**

"Where's Seth?" Brass asked, idly twirling a pen around on the tabletop with the tip of his finger. Dylan was refusing to speak about the case or his missing sister without legal representation, but nothing had been mentioned yet of the third Sidle sibling. "Huh? Where's little bro?"

"I don't know." Dylan hissed through clenched teeth. Either his high was quickly starting to fade, or he had toothache because he had been grinding them for several minutes now; a sound which felt like claws raking down Jim's spine.

"Sure you do. You said to my colleague," – he glanced at Catherine's hastily typed statement about the phone call – "_'I'm going to tell you the same thing I told Seth'_." Flicking his blue eyes over the piece of paper, he affixed the younger man with a steely glare and repeated his question. "So, where is he?"

"I don't know!" Dylan barked, slamming his hands on the table in frustration. "I talked to him on the phone. I don't know where he lives – we haven't seen each other for years."

"Well, it's nice to know that you share the disregard for both your siblings equally." Brass stated sardonically. Dylan seemed to take offence at the insinuation that he had neglected his brother and sister in some way. He threw his head back, raking dirty hands through his scraggly blonde hair.

"Hey, I tried to help him once before – he wasn't interested."

"Oh yeah? Maybe he knew what your kind of help entailed." Brass continued the harsh mockery, glad to be getting some kind of reaction out of the man even if it was only sullen anger.

"No, it wasn't like that." Dylan sniffed, shuffling further upright and leaning his elbows on the table. "I was sixteen when I moved out. I tried to take him away from them; okay. I got a job, I got a flat ... but he wouldn't come. He was too damn loyal to Laura."

"What about Sara? Did you try to save her, too?"

"Of course I did! But what was I supposed to do? She was just a little kid – I could hardly leave her alone all night while I worked my ass off at a takeout joint for three bucks an hour."

"But you could leave her in that house, with your parents." Jim raised an eyebrow, not entirely buying that this scruffy piece of flesh had tried to be the knight in shining armour for his family.

"Hey, I tried!" He snapped back. "I called the police, I reported them. Nothing happened. Nobody ever did anything about it."  
Tears were starting to creep down his stained face and he hurriedly wiped them away with an even grubbier sleeve.  
"And then, when Max died, I thought they would take her and put her somewhere safe. I didn't know what those people would do to her while she was in care. I never thought it could get worse than it was in that house."

His voice, cracked with emotions that he was rapidly losing control of, was increasing in volume with every strained word. A soft cry stuck in his throat, strangled by the dismissive scoff he hiccupped out in its place.  
"I trusted the system with my baby sister before, and look what it did. It was _supposed_ to protect her – _you people_ were supposed to protect her!"

Jim sat forward, never shifting his gaze.

"What do you think we're trying to do now?"

Dylan appeared to calm down a little, though the hard look in his watery eyes didn't fade.

"Then where is she?" He demanded, showing the briefest glimpse of fear for the first time since his arrest. "Who has her?"

There was a soft rap at the door and Jim turned to find Catherine gesturing for him through the window. He pushed himself away from the table and stood up, glowering down at the nearly-sobbing suspect.

"That's what we're trying to find out."


	15. January 13th, 1987

**January 13****th****, 1987 - - Mafia Commission Trial, sentencing**

"In regards to the three members of the Genovese family involved in buying, reselling and transporting of drugs and illicit materials, conspiracy to commit ..."

Raymond rolled his eyes towards the ceiling and muttered a fleeting Hail Mary under his breath. If ever there was a time to convert, this was it.

"...taking all these factors into consideration, and pursuant to the Sentencing Reform Act of 1984, it is the judgement of the court that the Defendants: Mr Roberto Masserio, Mr John Barone and Mr Raymond Acerbi are hereby committed to the custody of the Bureau of Prisons to be imprisoned for a term of seventeen years each."

Raymond felt his heart sink into his stomach, as a roar of discontent rose up from the gallery; the members of the Genovese family highlighting their supportive presence at the sentencing hearing. But he couldn't hear anything above the sound of his own blood rushing though his ears.

Seventeen years. Half a lifetime.

His arms were seized and yanked roughly behind his back, where cold steel was slapped around his wrists. It was a feeling he had become increasingly familiar with in recent months, but he still jumped at the harsh clang as the cuffs clicked shut.

He could feel the anger and hatred from some of the spectators – members of the public dubbed 'innocent victims of the mafia' by an indignant media – as snarls of revulsion echoed off the high grandiose ceiling. Raymond did his best to ignore the curses and threats and embittered insults thrown by the crowd as he was marched towards the heavy wooden door at the front of the courtroom alongside a more stoic Roberto and John.

Behind that door, he knew, lay a narrow staircase leading down to a set of bleak, single occupancy holding cells.

Tonight, they would dine on Italian food and wine – their last opportunity for such finery – and sleep on solid concrete blocks masquerading as beds; before being transferred tomorrow morning to the United States Federal Penitentiary in Marion, Illinois.

The door was thrown open and the three prisoners shoved through one at a time, into the dank, depressing corridor. Raymond held back the tears, plastering a look of ambivalence on his face despite the quivering fear in every bone of his body.

Seventeen years. The next time he walked as a free man, it would be in a very different world to the one he was leaving behind today.

* * *

**July 11****th****, 2004 - - Frank's Diner**

"So, Raymond gets out after spending half his life in prison and immediately goes looking for the people he blamed for his father's death?" Nick postulated with a frown, absent-mindedly dunking a cookie into his coffee mug.

"Well, seventeen years is a long time to brood." Brass shrugged, taking a long slurp of his own drink.

They had spent so much time cooped up in the lab that cabin fever was beginning to set in, and the boys decided a change of scenery might help clear the fog in their minds.

"Some people get a degree in prison; I guess Raymond just got angry." The detective continued blithely.

"Yeah, think about it." Warrick added, sinking his teeth into a large bacon sandwich and chewing thoughtfully on it. "He probably felt he didn't have a choice about entering the mafia after they killed his father. He was twenty six when he got sent down on a tacked-on charge against his boss. He spent his whole adult life behind bars, ultimately because someone killed Joseph. Wouldn't you be pissed off?"

"Sure, I'd be angry." Nick agreed, frowning morosely at the crumbs now floating in his mug. "But he had a chance to start his life again. Instead, he chooses to avenge his father's death forty years after the fact?"

"Nicky," Jim chuckled at the Texan's integral optimism. "These guys have made their lives around revenge. He probably spent his whole prison sentence planning how to get his own back. So, he gets out, looks up his dad's old pal Nino and tries to beat a confession out of him."

"But, Nino doesn't talk. So, he gets a cap in the head." Warrick mimed putting a gun to his head. "So, now it's Angelo's turn."

"Alright. But Angelo can't be found, so he kidnaps Sara in an attempt to lure him out." Nick nodded, following Warrick's mental timeline even if he still wasn't entirely convinced by it. "And ... bribes Sam Braun? For what?"

At the mention of the mogul's name, Jim glanced up with a quirked eyebrow.

"Hey, where is Catherine?" He asked, suddenly realising that he hadn't seen the strawberry-blonde for quite a while.

The CSI's exchanged a small shrug, less concerned with their assistant supervisor's location than that of their missing friend.

Sara's disappearance had knocked them all for six, but Catherine in particular seemed to be struggling more than Brass expected. From her erratic behaviour, he'd almost think _she_ had something to feel guilty about.

* * *

**March 21****st****, 2004 - - CSI Break Room**

"Oh, hey." Catherine blinked, surprised to find herself with some company on her unplanned break.

Sara lifted her head, offering a brief smile, before resuming staring at the open magazine on the bench. Judging by the three empty cups beside her and the fact that her eyes were still half-closed, Cath suspected that Sara hadn't actually taken in a word of the text.

"So, how are you?" She asked casually, ambling to the fridge and helping herself to a bottle of soda.

"Fine." Sara mumbled, drawing an eye roll from Catherine.

_Fine_. How many times had that word been uttered when Sara was in fact anything but _fine_.

"Yeah, everything okay at home?"

This time the question caught Sara's attention and she finally turned around to face her companion, suspicion written across her exhausted features.

"It's fine." She repeated carefully. "Why?"

"Nothing. You just look tired, that's all." She noted with a hint of concern, taking a seat at the centre bench next to the cagey brunette. "I wanted to check you were okay ... that there's nothing we should be worried about?"

Sara picked up on the undisguised question in her statement and pursed her lips.

"Everything's fine," she insisted, as if repeating the sentiment might make it seem more plausible. "I've just had a lot on my mind recently, that's all."

"Oh yeah?" Catherine folded her hands on the table and sat forwards. "Like what?"

"Just ... stuff." Sara shrugged, unsubtly gathering her things together with the intention of leaving before this conversation could veer into even more personal territory.

"Stuff like..." Cath pressed, following the movements with a trained eye. "Money?"

Sara's hands stilled, her gaze narrowing behind the brunette curls shielding her face.

"No." She drawled at last, but the drop in her voice still caused anxious butterflies to spring to life in Cath's stomach. Risking a bold move, she reached out to grip Sara's wrist before the girl could escape.

"Sar, you know you can come to us with any problems, right?"

Sara's eyes had widened at the unprecedented physical contact and she quickly retracted her own arm. For a few seconds, she just stared at Catherine in silent shock.

"I appreciate the concern," she mumbled hoarsely at last, though her tone suggested she decidedly did not appreciate it. "But I can manage my own life."

"Sara," Cath sighed. "Honey, I don't know what's made you do defensive, but I promise I'm not doing this to hurt you or to pry into your life. I just want to help."

"Why?" The suspicious question slipped out naturally before Sara could recall it, and caused a sadness to wash over Catherine's features.

"Because I care about you. And because I'm worried that you're in some kind of trouble you're not telling us about."

The look of panic on Sara's face was brief, so much so that Catherine wasn't even sure it had ever been there.

"I, uh..." She stuttered, deciding to abandon her things on the table and taking a determined step back. "I'd better get back to work."

Cath spun around on her stool, one hand still outstretched towards the rapidly departing figure.

"Sara, wait!"

* * *

**July 11****th,**** 2004 - - CSI Locker Room**

But she didn't wait. And nor did any later attempts to breach the subject yield more promising results.

Catherine sighed, letting her head fall into her hands despondently. If only she had tried harder, maybe she could have avoided some of this hell.

"Everything okay?" A gentle voice enquired, startling her out of her inner turmoil.

She turned to find Greg hovering in the threshold, a mug of freshly made coffee steaming in his hands. Even from here, she could smell it was his own private stash rather than the office sludge more closely resembling motor oil.

"I'm just ..." she threw one hand out, letting the sentence hang. Greg took the half-statement as permission to enter and ambled over, offering the drink to her.

"Sara?" He guessed, although it was blatantly obvious from the look on her face.

"I just keep thinking about that phone call." She explained, taking a large mouthful of the coffee and savouring the rich taste. "I wish I'd tried harder to get her to talk. I wish I'd done more to help her, when I had the chance."

"Do you think she'd have listened, even if you did?" Greg pointed out with a half smile.

"Probably not." She acknowledged. "But I'd feel better about it."

Greg nodded slowly in understanding, chewing on the inside of his cheek.

"So, you think that Dylan's right? That the family and the money have something to do with her disappearance?"

She straightened up, taking a deep, cleansing breath.

"I think ..." she paused, cocking her head to the side. "I think that there's more to the story than meets the eye."

"Well, you might be right there." Greg agreed, finally explaining his presence. At her enquiring nod, he joined her on the bench. "I've been looking into her family at the time of Max's death. The B&B was in serious trouble – so much so, a few months earlier Max had taken a loan to keep them afloat."

"You think that had something to do with his death?"

"Yeah, I do. The loan was from Angelo Valentino."

Cath's mouth opened silently as she realised where he was going with this.

"So, Max borrows money from his father-in-law and can't pay it back. Maybe Laura found out about it and that's why she killed him?"

"Well that's just it – I'm not so sure Laura _did_ kill Max." Greg continued with increased urgency. "I've been looking over the case files for Laura's arrest and trial. The initial police report stated that she was found catatonic in the bedroom, with the murder weapon beside her. _But_, when questioned, she kept referring to these _men_."

"What men?"

"Well that's just. Nothing ever came of it." He shrugged. "But, what if Angelo got fed up of waiting for his money and sent someone in to collect."

Catherine tilted her head back, letting the pieces of the puzzle slot into place.

"You think Laura was set up." She summed up.

"Exactly. It was thought Angelo disappeared after the Mafia Commission Trials, but actually the last reports of him being active in the criminal world is in 1983, right around the time Laura was arrested and two years before the trials were in full swing." He was getting more excited now, his hands gesticulating wildly with each word. "What if Angelo sent someone in to kill Max and Laura ended up taking the fall for it?"

"Well, this is all very interesting but how are you going to prove it?" She asked. "And how does it link to Sara's disappearance?"

"Don't know yet." He admitted, deflating slightly. "But if this was all about money, and Dylan knew about it, that might explain why he wouldn't help Sara with Laura's care bills."

Catherine exhaled, placing her hands on her knees.

"Okay, assuming you're right and this has nothing to do with Nino Carmine and Joseph Acerbi – maybe we should go and talk to Dylan again." She suggested, drawing a weak smile from the young technician.

"I can do you one better than that."


	16. July 11th 2004

**Hi guys, thanks for waiting for this chapter. I started my new job this week and have been living in a B&B with no wifi for several days while I get my new digs sorted out. In thanks for you patience, I shall endeavor to get the next chapter up tomorrow :)**

* * *

**July 11th, 2004 - - Las Vegas Police Department, Interrogation Room C**

Seth Sidle, like his big brother, had blonde hair and ocean blue eyes.

However, that is where the similarities ended; for he was clean, well groomed and much more alert than the eldest sibling. As soon as the door opened, he was out of his seat and across the room in two strides.

"Well, where is she? Have you found her?" He gushed frenetically. "No-one will tell me anything!"

Catherine held up her hands defensively, as Officer Mitchell ushered the man back towards his chair.

"Alright, why don't you just calm down." He instructed sternly, placing a firm hand on his shoulder.

"No!" Seth shrugged him off with a jolt. "You said my sister's missing. I want to know, what have you got?"

Catherine shot Greg a sideways glance and nodded towards the table.

"Mr Sidle," She cleared her throat. It felt strange just saying the name – she hadn't even called Sara by her surname in over two years. "When was the last time that you spoke to your sister?"

"Not ... not recently." He confessed, sinking back into his chair and clawing both hands through his silky blonde locks. "She phoned me a few weeks ago to talk about our mother, but aside from that ... honestly, we don't see each other often."

Catherine frowned softly at the man. The brothers could have been the same man, but for the bright spark that was present in Seth's eyes and the haunted glower that seemed permanently etched into Dylan's features. Yet, where Dylan was impulsive and reckless, Seth spoke slowly, carefully; as if he was mulling over each word before deciding whether to voice them out loud.

"What about Dylan?" Greg asked, folding his hands on the table. He had never sat in on an interrogation before. It felt powerful and vulnerable all at the same time.

"Dylan," Seth choked out a laugh, wiping a smooth hand over his mouth. "Dylan's a junkie. He ran out on us when we were just kids. He didn't want anything to do with our family."

"Well, no offence but I can see why he might want to cut himself off." Cath pursed her lips, hoping that the veiled insult might elicit a response.

Sure enough, Seth lifted himself out of his seat and pointed an accusatory finger at the CSI.

"Hey, my mother is not a murderer!"

Catherine cocked her head to the side, mildly surprised by the younger man's outburst. Clearly, that Italian temper was present in all the Sidle children.

"Why do you say that?"

"My father was a monster." He snarled. "He beat her, he beat all of us. He drove her to it."

"So, you do believe that your mother stabbed your father?" Greg clarified, picking up on Cath's point. "You just think she was justified in doing so."

"She _was_ justified." He shook his head with a perplexed scowl. "Look, I came here because you said Sara was missing – what the hell do my parents have to do with anything?"

"Well, your brother seems to think that they do." Greg continued. "You were only fourteen when your father died. What do you remember about your family's business?"

"What?" The man scoffed disbelievingly. "Their business? Are you serious?"

"Yes." Catherine encouraged bluntly. "Was money tight? Were they fighting more often than usual?"

"They were always fighting." He spat. "And money was always tight. Now, do you have anything on Sara or not?"

Sensing that they were going to lose his co-operation soon, Cath produced a sheet of paper and slid it across the table towards him.

"You father took a loan from your grandfather a few months before he died. Do you know anything about it?"

For the first time since they had sat down, Seth's foot stopped tapping on the floor and he sat forward with intrigue.

"No." He scanned the document hurriedly through narrowed eyes. "But then I was _only fourteen_. What would I know about it?"

Choosing to ignore the sarcastic tone of the comment, Cath took the paperwork back and folded her arms.

"So, Dylan didn't mention anything about it when he called you up and refused to give any money to help pay for Laura's care?"

Seth sat back in his seat, his eyes narrowed.

"Is there something you know about my parents that I don't?" He asked. "Has Dylan said something?"

"Look, we just want to find your sister." Catherine interjected, refusing to get drawn into his questions. "And the more information we have about her and her family, the sooner we can do that."

Seth sank back into his seat and crossed his arms sullenly.

"There's nothing else I have to say; so why don't you guys get back to me when you've found my sister."

* * *

**December 4****th****, 1982 - - Sidle's B&B, Tomales Bay, California**

Dylan's whole body went stiff at the sound of muted yelps and dull thuds echoing through the paper-thin walls. Placing his guitar gently on the floor, he rose from the bed and crept out of the room. He inched silently down the narrow corridor with his back pressed against the wall, holding his breath.

From here, he couldn't see the source of the noise, so it must be coming from the kitchen. He considered sneaking out of the house, as he frequently did, and disappearing for a night on his moped.

But then there was another crash, and a sharp cry that was instantly recognisable and impossible to ignore.

Launching himself off the wall, the teenager tore through the small house and burst unceremoniously into the kitchen.

The first thing he registered seeing was Seth, his little brother, standing at the far side of the room against the sink. He was white as a ghost, staring wide-eyed at the horror scene playing out before him.

In the centre of the room, Max had their mother pinned against the kitchen table. He was standing over her, tall and threatening with blood pouring down his bare arm where she had nicked him with the knife.

But the reason he had come running so fast was cowering against the fridge. His baby sister, barely nine years old, was visibly shaking as she tried fruitlessly to dodge her father's unsteady footsteps. Dyl could already see the bruises forming from whatever force he had applied to her tender, youthful skin.

"No, don't!" Laura wailed, attempting to push Max away. The smell of stale beer washing over her was suffocating, almost tangible, as he attempted to force himself on her right there in the middle of the room. "Please, don't!"

Spotting the discarded knife in the middle of the floor, Dylan darted for it and threw his entire weight into his father's bulky frame. But despite his inebriated state, Max was still faster and quickly grabbed the boy's wrist; squeezing so hard that he dropped the weapon again with a sharp clatter.

"Don't hurt him!" Sara yelled. Finding an extra bout of courage from somewhere, she jumped to her big brother's aid and began beating her tiny fists against his strong back; but it had about as much effect as Dylan's pitiful attempts to kick his father away.

When Max turned, one arm poised to hit Sara again, Dylan raised a knee firmly into his groin. In an instant, Max changed the path of his swing.

"Little bastard!" He snarled, his left fist colliding with Dylan's jaw and producing a thunderous crack that sent a shock reverberating through the room.

Dylan dropped like a stone on to the hard floor, his hands groping at his broken jaw bone.

High above him, Max stared emotionless down at his eldest son, writhing in pain, before haphazardly stumbling over him. Seemingly oblivious to the devastation he was walking away from, he brushed past his sobbing wife into the lounge.

Dylan scrunched his eyes closed, biting down on the surge of pain coursing through his entire face.

A small noise caught his attention and his eyes flew open, lest his father be coming back for round two. But the only thing he saw was the inverted image glinting in the edge of the knife. Sara, her chestnut curls and dark eyes so unlike those of his own, blinked at him through a sad, watery gaze.

But in the reflection of the blade, all he saw was a jagged crack lying between them.

* * *

**July 11th, 2004 - - Las Vegas Police Department, Interrogation Room B  
**

"After we got back from the hospital, I got into another fight with my parents. And then I left."

"You left?" Brass repeated.

"I packed a bag and took off." He sniffed, wiping away the tears that had started to creep from his eyes. "Laura was hysterical, crying and screaming at my father. Seth was sulking. And Sara ... Sara begged me to stay. She was apologising, blaming herself..."

"Wait, she blamed herself for _you_ leaving?" Nick frowned. "She was nine years old."

"I know." He mumbled with a half-hearted shrug. "But because he broke my jaw while I was protecting her, she thought it was all her fault. She blamed herself for everything bad that happened in our house – she had quite a complex when she was a kid."

"Alright," Jim held up his hands to stop the line of conversation. It pained him enough to think about Sara's past, he didn't need to hear about it in detail. "So, your father busts your jaw and you bail. Then what?"

"I took some of the painkillers I'd been given – too many, probably; and I had a couple of drinks. I was angry, so I went back to the house. I don't know if I was hoping to have another argument, but ... I saw them leave – the men. There were two of them."

"What did _they_ look like?"

"It was dark." He shrugged again. "They were in suits, dark hair and one of them was wearing sunglasses even though it was the middle of the night."

"So, you phoned the police and told them what you'd seen, right?" The detective cocked his head to the side. "Oh no, that's right, you didn't."

"I was a stupid teenager! And I'd been in trouble with the cops already; I knew they wouldn't believe a word I said."

"What about Sara, and Seth? Did they know anything about these guys you saw?"

"No, nothing. They were just kids." He moped. "I knew something must have happened so I went inside and ... and Sara was stood in the bedroom, just staring at him. I picked her up and put her into her room, and I told Seth to call the cops. Then I left again."

"So, what about the money?" Nick placed his hands flat on the table, everything about his body language screaming frustration. "I mean, I just don't get it man? If I knew my mother had been wrongly convicted I'd do anything I could to help her. I certainly wouldn't let my sister take full financial responsibility for her care."

"That money is tainted!" Dylan insisted, tapping finger on the table top. "All of our father's assets went to us, equally; with the clause that we all have to sign before it can be accessed."

"And what?" Jim pushed. "You didn't want to see all that money disappear into a care home. I don't know, maybe you had some plans for it already? Stock market investments, perhaps?"

Dylan shot the older man a derisive look, not appreciative of the blatant sarcasm.

"My grandfather gave Max a loan, and he never got it back. I knew that if we released it, it would bring everything out into the open again."

Nick sat forwards, holding Dylan's gaze.

"So, you let your baby sister take the weight of Laura's care, rather than tell the police the truth."

"I ... I didn't..." He shrugged meekly, the tears flowing freely by now down his haggard face. "I'm sorry. I'm really sorry."

Brass and Nick shared a look, as their subject collapsed forwards and buried his face in his arms on the table.

They couldn't be sure, but they both suspected his desperate apology wasn't intended for either of them.

* * *

**July 11th, 2004 - - CSI, Layout Room  
**

"Alright, so Laura didn't kill Max. I still think Raymond Acerbi has something to do with it." Nick insisted, rapping his knuckle on the black and white photo of the gangster's son.

"Me too." Catherine agreed. "But I don't think Dylan knew that, I think he genuinely believes his grandfather has her because of that loan and the money Max left them."

"Well, he might not have her, but I think he is at the centre of all this."Warrick rubbed his tired eyes. "Only problem is we don't know where he is; and we still haven't found Acerbi – he's not in any of his registered properties.

"Maybe he's skipped town." Greg suggested. "He has properties in New York, as well. We could put out a broadcast to NYPD."

"Already done." Catherine cut in. "They're going to call us if they find him."

"So," Nick exhaled. "Where the hell does that leave us?"

As if on cue, Grissom burst into the room with a rare display of urgency.

"Guys, get in the cars." He ordered bluntly, waving his cell phone in the air. "We've found Raymond Acerbi's hideout."


	17. July 11th 2004 - July 12th 2004

**July 11****th****, 2004 - - Las Vegas, Enterprise Highway**

"So, are you going to tell me?" Catherine urged once they got away from the town traffic and onto the quiet desert roads.

"I don't know." Grissom stated in a clipped tone; his gaze remaining trained on the dark, gloomy path stretching ahead of them. The only thing leading him was the flashes of blue and red illuminating the star-filled sky in the distance. "All I know is Acerbi has been seen in a warehouse that's leased under a false name."

In the car behind them, Warrick beeped his horn angrily at an animal that darted out in front of him. They could picture him swearing and swerving violently while Nick and Greg clung onto the door handles for dear life.

After what felt like an age of driving in anxious silence, the convoy of vehicles came to a screeching halt outside a seemingly abandoned warehouse situated in a deserted industrial park.

Close to their stopping point was a police car with the rear door open and a fierce-looking Uniform standing guard over the dark-haired man in the backseat. Catherine's heart skipped a beat at the sight of their target in handcuffs – after the stress of the last week, all of a sudden they were tantalisingly close to getting Sara back.

However, her hopes were quickly dashed when two paramedics strolled out of the warehouse empty handed.

"Oh, God." She breathed. "Oh, no."

The team exited their cars and moved as one unit towards the awaiting group of police officers. Their grim expressions, needless to say, did not fill them with optimism.

"She's not here." Jim stepped out from the crowd with his hands up before they could even start to throw questions at him. "We get a lot of teenagers shooting off guns up here. The arresting officer was doing a routine check and got a bit excited when he found paperwork relating to Raymond Acerbi in this guy's pocket."

Grissom peered inside the police car at the sullen-looking young man. Even in the dim light, he was instantly recognisable as the man from the CCTV footage who had taken Sara.

"Who is this guy?" The usually placid entomologist barked with irritation.

"We don't know; he won't give up his name." The young cop who answered had materialised at his side and offered up the aforementioned paperwork.

"I'll get it out of him." Brass snarled, leaving the CSIs and stalking towards the car with his hands balled into fists. It was no secret that the hardened detective was the best in the department at extracting information from suspects – tonight he'd extract teeth if it got him closer to finding the missing criminalist.

"Any sign of Sara in the buildings?" Cath asked, although she suspected that she already knew the answer.

"No, nothing." The cop sighed, tilting his head towards the cloudless sky and exhaling a deep breath; which clouded into faint white wisps in the cold air. "The whole place looks deserted."

"So, what was he doing here?" Gil frowned, gesturing again towards the car.

"I don't know. Maybe you should ask _him_." The officer stepped aside, revealing another hereto unseen man being questioned on the far side of the lot.

Catherine's gaze locked with that of the second suspect and her heart sank into the pit of her stomach.

"Oh, you've got to be kidding me!"

* * *

"I told you Muggs, I don't know anything about your missing friend."

Despite the pleading sincerity in his voice, her snort of repulsion suggested that she didn't believe him.

"We have that man on tape kidnapping Sara; and now you're out here in the dead of night giving him money!"

"I was sent this." Sam extracted a neatly folded letter from his top pocket and held it up for them to read. It was short and concise – instructions to bring the money to this address tonight and to tell no one else.

"And it never occurred to you to bring that to the lab?" Catherine snatched it from him and slipped it into a plastic evidence bag. "I told you, if you received any more information from them _I_ wanted to know about it!"

"I was trying to save my life." He offered by way of excuse.

"Yeah, well I'm more concerned with saving Sara's life." She spat; and Sam had no doubt that she would sacrifice him in a heartbeat if it increased Sara's chance of survival.

Brass, by now, had ambled over too.

"Why is it, Sam, that whenever bodies start dropping in this town, all roads seem to lead back to you?" He enquired tersely.

"Coincidence."

"This is no joke, Sam." Catherine hissed, jabbing a finger into his chest. "And you can keep saying that you don't know anything about this, but I don't buy it. You don't do these things yourself – you send one of your lackeys to do it for you."

"I prefer to deal with blackmail in person." He shrugged lazily. "I was hoping to get Acerbi by himself. To ... reason with him."

"Yeah, sure." Brass nodded, not believing for a second that his plans were so civil. "So, where is Raymond?"

"I don't know."

When it was clear that they were not going to accept a word he was saying, the mogul rolled his eyes and sighed wearily.

"Alright, you want to know what _I_ know?" He asked rhetorically. "I know why Raymond's so angry. And he's right – Nino, Angelo and myself did agree to Joey's plot to usurp Tony."

"Tony Accardo, the mafia boss from Chicago." Brass clarified.

"Yes, but it was a foil. The plan was to set him up for a big fall. It was never intended to kill him."

"So, you don't know who shot him?" Cath raised a sceptical eyebrow.

"No. It could have been Nino or Angelo. Or half the Made Men in New York, for that matter." He tilted his head to the side, licking his lips slowly in thought. "But whoever it was, I can't say that I blame them. Killing Tony would have started a war – killing Joey probably saved a lot of innocent people."

"Yeah, well that might well be the case." Catherine wrapped her coat around herself tighter, though even that wasn't enough to fend off the chilling thoughts that had embedded themselves so deeply in her bones. "But it could still get Sara killed."

* * *

**July 12****th****, 2004 - - Las Vegas Police Department, Interrogation Room A**

The man sat perfectly still, staring stoically at the one-way mirror with the glazed eyes only a ruthless criminal could possess.

"Roberto Masserio Junior." Brass exhaled, cocking his head to the side. "Or do you prefer Bobby?"

Bobby shifted his cold eyes to the detective's face, but his lips remained tightly pursed.

"I mean, that's what your old man used to call you, right? Before he got sent down. Along with Johnny Barone and ... well, what do you know, Raymond Acerbi."

Still no response from their suspect, but his jaw twitched at the mention of his father. Jim sat forwards, resting his elbows on the table.

"It must have been tough, growing up without a dad. I looked up his details," He opened a file and turned it around to show the man. On top of the paperwork lay a black and white photo of the late Roberto Masserio Senior. Bobby's cold gaze latched onto it, as if he was trying to recall all the long-forgotten features, but his own expression never softened.  
"He died in prison, six months before he was due to be released. And that's when Raymond started looking out for you. He took you under his wing, taught you the trade; and even let you collect his ransom money." He slid a second photo across the desk, this time of someone far more recognisable. "So, where is she?"

For the first time since his arrest, Bobby reacted; though his movements were slow and calculated. He picked up the photograph, staring at it long and hard for a minute, before sliding it back towards Jim.

"Ci sono alcuni peccati," He mumbled hoarsely, "per cui il perdono non può essere acquistato."

* * *

"This guy?" Nick scoffed from the other side of the window. "Seriously, you're relying on this guy to find Sara?"

"He obviously works for Raymond." Grissom pointed out. "Acerbi wouldn't send someone he didn't trust to collect ransom money, right?

"Yeah, but this guy isn't going to talk." The Texan continued angrily. "He hasn't said a word all night, and what he does say no-one can understand."

"That's because he knows that his boss will kill him if he talks." Warrick added.

"I wonder if Sara understands Italian." Catherine mused quietly from the back of the room. The boys turned to her, surprised by the odd remark.

"What difference does that make?"

"Well, if she does then she might have been able to converse with them – reason with them, maybe."

They nodded slowly, conceding her point. Of course, there was a flip side to that; that if Sara couldn't understand what they were saying then she'd be even more terrified. However, though they all shared that depressing thought, nobody elected to voice it out loud.

The unsettling silence was interrupted by both doors opening simultaneously. Jim stood in one, looking exhausted and frustrated with the unsuccessful interrogation. Opposite him, practically shaking with energy, stood Greg armed with a large laminated item rolled up and tucked beneath his arm.

For a few seconds, they just blinked at each other across the cramped room.

"I found something." He exclaimed at last, striding to the table and unrolling his item. It was a map of Las Vegas. "Archie checked silent Bobby's phone records and tracked the most recent messages to a tower on West Charleston." He produced a pen and circled it.

"Well, that's right on the edge of town." Catherine noted with a scowl.

"Right." Greg nodded eagerly. "And I checked his car's GPS. He has been doing a lot of driving. About twenty miles after the last message was sent."

"Okay." Warrick took the pen and circled a roughly twenty-mile radius on around the previous mark. "That's still a huge search area."

"Well, maybe I can narrow that down for you." They team whirled around en mass, surprised to find David Hodges had graced them with their presence. "You know, there is a layout room in the lab for this kind of thing." He noted with derision at seeing them all crowded around the tiny table.

"Do you have something?" Grissom demanded. He had no time for the lab rat's sarcasm today.

"I checked the trace you guys pulled from your suspect's car. It's sand."

"Oh, great." Nick threw up his hands. "That's fantastic Hodges, expect we live in a fucking desert!"

"Alright, but if you'd let me finish, I could explain." Giving the irate southern CSI a wide birth, he stepped up the map and snatched a pen off Greg. "See, the sand I found was rich in several minerals, including silver, zinc and carnotite. My guess is, wherever your guy's been driving, it's near a mine. Or several mines – somewhere near the mountains, probably."

"Carnotite." Gil repeated, scanning the circled search area. "Potosi."

"What?" Cath asked, trying to see what he was evidently seeing on the map. In answer to her question, he pointed at a single point where a mountain range met with the desert.

"Carnotite was found in Mount Potosi but it's not mined there. And there's only one place I know of where it's found that you can drive to without a specialist mountain vehicle. That's where he has her."

All of them leant closer, staring at the bleak desert landscape for a long moment; trying to place what exactly they were supposed to be seeing. But, again, it was Nick who spoke up first, with a sentiment that summed up what they were all thinking.

"Where the hell is that?"

* * *

**July 12****th****, 2004 - - Potosi Mountain, Nevada Desert **

The front door collapsed into a cloud of splinters and dust as the cops barrelled their way inside; like a hoard of locusts they spilled into the rickety wooden shack and fanned out.

"Raymond Acerbi!" Brass hollered into the empty darkness, his gun drawn at his hip. "Show yourself!"

Nick and Warrick were already skirting behind him towards the darkened room at the end of the hallway.

The door was already open part way, but a sharp kick from Warrick's boot nearly took it off its hinges.

The act proved to be a mistake, as a whoosh of debris gathered in the backs of their throats causing them to cough and splutter while the dust settled around them.

Once their vision cleared enough to see into the room, they both felt a rush of adrenaline which quickly turned into despair.

Hanging off the wall was a set of rusty shackles, next to an empty chair.

Chains, a security guard's watch point ... but no Sara.

By now the police had cleared the rest of the small building – if you could call it that – and Catherine, Grissom, Greg and Jim all joined the guys in stared breathlessly at the empty spot where they hopes now lay dashed.

Finally, Cath stepped forwards and dropped to her knees, scooping the stone cold chains into her hands.

"We're too late!" She wailed, tears springing to her eyes.

Nick emitted an enraged roar, turning around and landing a kick against the wall, sending his foot straight through the flimsy wood panel.

"The son of a bitch!" He growled, his fierce movements causing the whole structure to shake. "I swear, when I find him, I'm going to kill him!"


End file.
